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SEVENTEEN 

DISCOURSES 



ON SEVERAL 



TEXTS OF SCRIPTURE; 

ADDRESSED TO 

CHRISTIAN ASSEMBLIES, 

IN VILLAGES 
NEAR CAMBRIDGE. 

TO WHICH ARE ADDED 

SIX MORNING EXERCISES. 



BY ROBERT ROBINSON. 



ALL Nations of men.. ..should seek the lord, if haply they 

MIGHT FEEL AFTER HIM, AND FIND HIM. ActS, XVii. 26, 27. 



FIRST AMERICAN EDITION. 

WITH A 

LIFE OF THE AUTHOIUi 



/ 

BOSTON : 

PUBLISHED BY CUMMINGS, BILLIARD, k CO. 
HILLIARD AND METCALF, PRINTERS* 
1824. 



2X&333 I 



i 



LIFE 

OP 

ROBERT ROBINSON. 



Robert Robinson was born at S waff ham, county of 
Norfolk, on the eighth of October, 1735. His father 
was a native of Scotland, and an exciseman, of whom 
little needs be said, except that his humble sphere in 
life received no dignity from his understanding, and no 
brightness from his virtues. Mary Wilkin, the mother 
of Robert Robertson, was descended from a respectable 
family, and to the advantages of a good education she 
added the charms of a beautiful person, an amiable tem- 
per, and gentleness of manners. She was the daughter 
of a second marriage, and, as unnatural as it may seem, 
the affections .of her father were centered in the child- 
ren of his wife by a former husband. Mary was doom- 
ed to experience from him less of the tenderness of a pa-> 
rent, than of the austerity and unfeelingness of a severe 
master. He delighted to thwart her purposes ; and on 
several occasions, through mere caprice, he rejected 
the overtures of worthy and respectable persons, who 
solicited his daughter's hand. 

Disheartened by the severity of her father's treat- 
ment, and impatient to escape from it, she imprudently 
resolved on marrying without his consent. This step 
was a prelude to untried evils. She united herself to a 
man in all respects unworthy of her, possessing neither 
the qualifications for making her happy, nor the dispo- 
sition to soften and conciliate her father. 



ly LIFE OF ROBINSON. 

They had three children, of whom Robert was the 
youngest. The elder son was apprenticed to a painter, 
and the daughter to a mantuamaker. Robert was put 
to school when six years old, and soon drew the atten- 
tion of his teacher, as exhibiting more than usual prom- 
ise. In the mean time, his father removed from SwaiF- 
ham, and settled at Scaring. He soon after died, and 
left the destitute mother to provide for herself, and 
three children. At Scaring was a grammar school, 
where Lord Thurlow, and some other distinguished per- 
sons, received the rudiments of their education. De- 
sirous of encouraging her son's predilection for learn- 
ing, Mrs. Robinson made an effort to maintain him at 
this school, but her resources proved inadequate to the 
expense. So favourable an impression had he made, 
however, on his teacher, the Rev. Joseph Brett, and so 
much did this gentleman respect the motives and vir- 
tues of the mother, that he kindly ofl'ered to instruct his 
pupil without compensation. 

On these terms he continued at school till he was 
fourteen years old, studied the French and Latin, and 
made rapid proficiency in most of the branches com- 
monly pursued at such institutions. The time had now 
come when it was necessary to decide on his future des- 
tination. So many discouragements were in the way of 
his being a scholar, and so many difficulties to be en- 
countered, that his mother resigned this hope, which 
she had suffered to rise and brighten for a time, and 
was only concerned to place him beyond the reach of 
want by providing for him an honest calling. His be- 
nevolent instructer, Mr. Brett, made interest to procure 
a situation suited to his capacity and inclination, but 
without success. He was finally bound an apprentice 
to a hairdresser in London. 

To this new employment he at first devoted himself 
with commendable industry, received the approbation 
of his master, and was able to boast of a due proficiency 
jn the mysteries of his trade. But his thoughts were not 
to be chained, nor could nature be forced. His mind 
was too active to rest in vacuity, and his love of books 
too strong to be conquered by the routine of a barber'^ 



LIFE OF ROBINSOxV. V 

shop. It was his custom to rise at four in the morning, 
and from that hour till calied to his master''s service, he 
was busy in reading such books as he could collect from 
the cheap stalls or borrow from his friends. 

His thoughts early took a religious bias, and after go- 
ing to London a constant attendance on public worship 
was among his greatest pleasures. Gill, Guise, Ro- 
maine, and Whitefield were his favourite preachers. 
His diary at this time indicates no small degree of reli- 
gious enthusiasm, and proves him to have gradually at- 
tached himself to the Methodists. Whitefield, in short, 
was his adviser and friend, to whom he applied in all 
cases of spiritual difficulty, and with whom he familiar- 
ly corresponded. On one occasion Whitefield read to 
his congregation at the Tabernacle two of Robinson's 
letters, while the writer was present. lEncouraged bj 
the favourable opinion of so distinguished a man, and 
moved by the advice of his friends, it is not a matter of 
surprise that he should begin to think himself destined 
to walk in a broader sphere, than the one on which he 
had entered. 

So great, indeed, were the esteem and respect which 
he gained by his genius and good character, that his 
master was not reluctant to comply with the general 
voice, and give up his indentures. At the age of nine- 
teen he commenced preaching among the Methodists. 
His youth, his amiable manners, his vivacity and native 
eloquence drew around him many hearers, and gave a 
charm to his preaching, which could not fail to please. 
His voice was clear and melodious, his elocution easy 
and distinct, his language flowing, and all his external 
accomplishments engaging. These advantages, height- 
ened by a liberal degree of youthful enthusiasm, crown- 
ed his first efforts with success, and animated his future 
exertions. He spared no pains to cultivate the powers 
which nature had bestowed on him, and frequently de- 
claimed by the hour in private, that he might acquire 
the habit of a read}'- delivery, and a free use of lan- 
guage. In this practice the foundation was laid of his 
subsequent eminence as a public speaker. He thouglit 
no time misspent, which prepared him for winning the 



^l LIFE OP ROBINSON. 

ear and gaining the hearts of his audience, and thus 
more effectually discharging the duties of his sacred of- 
fice. 

Among the Methodists Mr. Robinson preached chiefly 
in Norwich, and different parts of Norfolk and Cam- 
bridgeshire. While thus emplo^'ed he resisted a tempt- 
ation, which deserves to be recorded as a proof of hig 
early integrity and strength of principle. He had been 
educated in the established church, and had not joined 
himself to the dissenters without examining the causes 
and nature of their dissent. When his talents and vir- 
tues had gained him a name in the world, some of his 
relations, who seem to have forgotten him before, made 
an attempt to bring him back to the episcopal church. 
The following incident is mentioned by Dr. Rees, the 
learned editor of the Cyclopaedia, in his Sermon preach- 
ed on the occasion of Mr. Robinson's death. '•'• A rich 
relation, who had promised to provide liberally for him, 
and who had bequeathed him a considerable sum in his 
will, threatened to deprive him of every advantage 
which he had been encouraged to expect, unless he 
quitted his connexion with the dissenters ; but the rights 
of conscience, and the approbation of God, were superi- 
or, in his regard, to every worldly consideration ; he 
preserved his integrity, steadily maintained his princi- 
ples, and persevered in his connexion with the dissent- 
ers, but forfeited the favour of his relation, and every 
advantage, which, living or flying, he had in his power to 
bestow."* This conduct was consistent with his char- 
acter through life. A high-minded independence, con- 
scientious regard for truth and liberty, and unyielding 
adherence to his religious impressions, w^ere among the 
shining virtues, which never forsook him. 

The causes leading to his separation from the me- 
thodists are not distinctly known, but he had not preach- 
ed with them more than two years, when, at the head 
of a few persons associated for the purpose, he formed 
an independent society in Norwich. At this time he 
was a Calvinist, and constructed the confession of faith 

* Dr. Rees's Sermon on the Death of Mr. Robert Robinson^, 
J). 59. 



LIFE OF PvOBINSON. Vli 

for his new society on Calvin istic principles. He adopt- 
ed the rules and discipline common to other indepen- 
dent churches, and administered the ordinances after the 
same manner. 

In the year 1759, not lon^ after this society was or- 
ganized, Mr. Robinson was invited to take charge of a 
Baptist congregation at Cambridge. He was already 
convinced, that adults only were the proper subjects of 
baptism, and he had himself been baptized by immer- 
sion. The Cambridge society was small, and the pecu- 
niary circumstances of its members such, as to afford 
him no more than a very scanty support. When he com- 
menced preaching in Cambridge he was twenty-three 
years of age, and two years afterwards he was ordained 
according to the usual mode of the dissenters. He had 
been married a little before to a young lady of Nor- 
wich. 

Mr. Robinson's own account of his settlement, written 
at a later period of his life, will show his prospects to 
have been not the most flattering. In reference to this 
subject he observes ; " The settlement of Robinson 
seems rather a romantic, than rational undertaking, for 
this pastor was to be maintained. He had not received 
above ten guineas from his own family for some years ; 
he had no future prospect of receiving any; his grand- 
father had cut him off with a legacy of half a guin- 
ea. He had received only a hundred pounds with his 
wife, and this he had diminished among the Methodists. 
He had never inquired what his congregation would al- 
low him, nor had any body proposed any thing. They 
had paid him for the first half-year, three pounds twelve 
shillings and five pence ; they had increased since, but 
not enough to maintain him frugally ; there was no pros- 
pect of so poor a people supplying him long, especially 
should his family increase, which it was likely to do. 
Besides, the congregation, through the libertinism of 
many of its former members, had acquired a bad char- 
acter. These would have been insurmountable difficul- 
ties to an older and wiser man ; but he was a boy, and 
the love of his flock was a million to him. His settle- 
ment, therefore, on this article, should be no precedeBt 
for future settlements." 



Vlll LIFE OF ROBINSON - 

The situation here describ(»cl could have {ew charms 
for a man who had set his heart on the tbiugs of this 
world, or W'hose fancy was quickened by the kindling vis- 
ions of power and tlime. But Robinson was not such a 
man. He loved his profession, and every motive of 
self-aggrandizement was absorbed in the deeper and 
purer desire of witnessing the growth of pietj, good or- 
der, and happiness among his people. His congrega- 
tion grew larger, and the time came when his annual 
income was increased to more than ninety pounds. At 
first he lived at Fulbourn, five miles from the place of 
his sabbath duties, where he contracted an acquaintance 
with Mr. Graves, a gentleman of property and benevo- 
lence, from whom he received many substantial tokens 
of friendship. 

He next removed to Hauxton, about the same dis- 
tance from Cambridge, where he resided for several 
years, the tenant of an humble cottage, devoted assidu- 
ously to his professional labours, and providing for the 
support of a numerous family, and an aged mother. His 
disinterested ardour, his kindness to the poor, his love 
of doing good, and his unwearied activity in making 
himself useful, attracted to him the notice of all the re- 
spectable part of the community, and quickened the 
generosity of some worthy and opulent persons. On 
the sabbath he often preached three times, and during 
the week several times in the neighbouring villages. 
He was intimate with all the surrounding clergy among 
the dissenters, and had for his early companions Roland 
Hill and Charles de Coetlogon. His congregation in- 
creased so much, that a more commodious place of wor- 
ship was found necessary, and the pastor was highly 
gratified with the promptness and unanimity with which 
it was erected. 

In the midst of his professional labours he was a dili- 
gent student in theology and literature. Free access 
to the libraries of the University of Cambridge, and con- 
versation with the learned men residing there, enabled 
him to pursue his studies with advantage. He was an 
admirer of Saurin, and in 1770 translated and published 
two of his serjpons. These were sent out as specimens, 



LIFE OF ROBINSON. iX 

which, if approved, he promised should be the forerun- 
ners of others. The success of his project was quite 
equal to his expectation, and he afterwards translated 
at different times five volumes of sermons selected from 
Saurin. These have gone through several editions, and 
together with a sixth volume by Hunter, and a seventh 
by Sutcliffe, they constitute the works of Saurin, as they 
now appear in the English dress. 

While residing in the cottage at Hauxton he also pub- 
lished his Arcana, or the Principles of the late Petition^ 
ers to Parliament for Relief in Matter of Subscription^ 
in eight Letters to a Friend. These letters were adapt- 
ed to the times, and attracted a lively attention. The 
dissenters were making all possible exertions to have 
the law repealed, which required from them subscrip- 
tion to the articles. Presbyterians and Baptists, ortho- 
dox and heterodox, united their forces to abolish a law, 
which operated with equal severity on them all, and 
which was in itself so flagrant an encroachment on jus- 
tice, liberty, the rights of conscience, and the claims of 
humanity. All rallied under the same banner, and cri- 
€d out with one voice against the oppression which 
weighed them down, till, after many unsuccessful strug- 
gles, their voice was heard, their petitions heeded, and 
dissenting ministers and schoolmasters were allowed the 
privilege of prosecuting their peaceful avocations with 
out violating their conscience by subscribing the Thir- 
ty-nine Articles, or subjecting themselves to a civil pen- 
alty by resisting so unholy a requisition. During this 
struggle for Christian freedom the above letters were 
written. Clothed in a language always sprightly, some- 
times adorned with glowing imagery, sometimes rising 
with the majesty of argument, and at others pungent 
with satire, they were well calculated for popular ef- 
fect. They enter largely into the chief points of the 
controversy, and bating some defects of style, and per- 
haps occasional faults of sentiment, it will be rare to 
find a more ingenious vindication of the rights and priV'^ 
ileges of Christian liberty. 

Robinson left Hauxton in 1773, and settled at Ches- 
terton within two miles of Cambridge. This brought 



X LIFE OF ROBINSON. 

him nearer to the centre of his parochial charge, and 
the facilities for his literary pursuits were multiplied 
by his proximity to the University. But his income was 
not yet adequate to support a family of nine children, 
and he was compelled to look around him for other 
sources of emolument. He turned his attention to ag- 
riculture. By rigid economy, personal inspection of 
his affairs, judicious investments, and a spirit of enter- 
prise that never slumbered, he found himself in a few 
years a thriving farmer, and had the joy to feel, that by 
the blessing of Providence his numerous family was be- 
yond the grasp of want, and the caprice of fortune. Mr. 
Dyer thus speaks of his character as a farmer and econ- 
omist. " It would be no less agreeable than instructive 
to survey his rural economy, and domestic arrangements 
in his new situation ; the versatility of his genius was 
uncommon ; and whether he was making a bargain, re- 
pairing a house, stocking a farm, giving directions to 
workmen, or assisting their labours, he was the same 
invariable man, displaying no less vigour in the execu- 
tion of his plans, than ingenuity in their contrivance. 
The readiness with which he passed from literary pur- 
suits to rural occupations, from rural occupations to do- 
mestic engagements, from domestic engagements to the 
forming of plans for dissenting ministers, to the settling 
of churches, to the solving of cases of conscience, to 
the removing of the difficulties of ignorant, or softening 
the asperities of quarrelsome brethren, was surprising."* 
This is the language of one who lived near him, for 
many years, and saw him often. 

His professional duties were numerous. Those per- 
taining to his own parish made but a part. He was in- 
vited to attend ordinations in all the counties around 
him; his judgment was respected and his advice sought 
in cases of differences between churches ; he was the 
counsellor of his parishioners in their temporal as well 
as spiritual concerns ; the watchful guardian of the un- 
protected and distressed ; the patron and benevolent 
frii^nd of the poor. These calls of duty did not relax 
his literary ardour. He went on with his translations 
of Saurin, printed now and then an occasional sermon 

♦ Dyers Life of Robinson, p. 98, 



LIFE OF ROBINSON. XI 

of his own, and, at the request of two or three eminent 
gentlemen, wrote a treatise on Affinities in Marriage, 
which was highly commended by jurists, as marked by 
an acute discrimination and force of argument. 

About the year 1776, Robinson published his Plea for 
the Divinity of Christ. This topic was now much agi- 
tated by reason of the late resignation of Lindsey and 
Jebb for scruples of conscience concerning the trinity. 
Robinson's Plea is drawn up with ingenuity, in a popu- 
lar style, and winning manner. But even this popular 
treatise did not please all parties. None withheld from 
the author the merit of ingenuity ; some professed to 
admire the force and accuracy of his reasoning ; while 
others were troubled with a kind of indefinable suspi- 
cion, that he had stopped short of the desired object. 
These latter seem to have been alarmed, that the 
author was so sparing of the fire and the rage of con- 
troversy. Robinson observes, in writing to a friend, 
*' The temper of the Plea has procured me a deal of 
blame from the good folks, who inhabit the torrid zone." 
These zealous partizans were not satisfied, that he 
should win the day, unless he carried war with flames 
and sword into the conquered enemy's camp. 

Others, however, were of a different mind, and the 
author received a profusion of complementary letters 
from dignitaries in the established church. It was whis- 
pered, and more than once proclaimed aloud, as a thing 
to be lamented, that such a man should be a dissenter, 
and waste his days in strolling with a bewildered flock 
beyond the enclosures of the true faith. Gilded oflers 
were made to him, if be would have the conscience to 
«lide out of his errors, go up from the unseemly vale of 
poverty, and take his rest on the commanding eminence 
of church preferment. To these over^^ures he was 
deaf; from his principles he could not be moved. When 
Dr. Ogden said to him, in trying to unsettle his purpose, 
"Do the dissenters know the worth of the man?" he 
replied, " The man knows the worth of the dissenters." 
This reply he verified by his warm devotedness to 
their interests through life. He received many letters 
approving hi« work from persons not belonging to the 



iii LIFE OP ROBINSON. 

episcopal church, especially his Baptist associates in the 
tiiinistry. 

The year after the Plea, Robinson published a curi- 
ous tract, entitled the The History and Mystery of Good 
Friday. In this pamphlet he traces back the church 
holydays to their origin, and proves them for the most 
part to have arisen out of heathen, or Jewish practices, 
and to derive no authority from the Christian religion. 
It contains a severe, and somewhat rough philippic 
against the church of England, which boasts of being 
reformed, and having cast off the abuses of the Romish 
church, while yet many are cherished, as unwarranta- 
ble and pernicious as those severed from the old stock. 
This tract was exceedingly popular, and ran speedily 
through several editions. 

But the work, which produced greater excitement 
than any of our author's writings, was a Plan of Lec- 
tures on the Principles of Nonconformity., published in 
1778. Within a moderate compass, it embraces all the 
points of controversy between the established church 
and the dissenters. Its manner is original and striking. 
The time of its appearance was favourable to its cur- 
rency and interest, for the dissenters' bill whs then 
pending in parliament. In the House of Lords this Plan 
of Lectures was honourably mentioned by Lord Shel- 
burne, and in the House of Commons, Burke read passa- 
ges from it, which he attempted to turn to the advan- 
tage of the petitioners. Fox repelled his attack, and 
foiled his attempt. Many articles were written against 
it, and, among others, strictures by Mr, Burgess, pre- 
bendary of Winchester. Robinson replied to none, ex- 
cept the latter, on which he bestowed a ^e.\Y remarks in 
his preface to the fifth edition. 

The next literary enterprise of Robinson was his 
translation of Claude''s Essay on the Composition of a Ser- 
mon. To this essay the translator added a life of the 
author, remarks on the history of preaching, and a vast 
body of notes, making together two thick volumes. 
The notes are written in the author's peculiar manner, 
full of spirit and vivacity, and discover a prodigious ex- 
tent of reading. Some of them are valuable, and many 



LIFE 0¥ ROBINSON. XUI 

are highly entertaining, but they seem to have been 
hastily thrown together, and collected with too little 
discrimination. They occasionally descend to trifling 
incidents, anecdotes, and inapposite reflections, equally 
offensive to good taste, and barren of instruction. But 
with all these defects, Robinson's original edition is vast- 
ly preferable to those coming after, in which the edi- 
tors took the liberty to abridge the notes, and add oth- 
ers of their own. In the Rev. Charles Simeon's edition, 
the notes are chiefly omitted, and their place supplied 
by skeletons of his own sermons. 

Mr. Robinson's celebrated volume of Village Discour- 
ses was published in 1786. We have already observed, 
that it was his custom to preach in the neighbouring vil- 
lages, and frequently he tarried at a place over night, 
and held religious service early in the morning, before 
the labourers were gone to their work. In summer these 
exercises were conducted in the open air, and fully attend- 
ed. The abovementioned volume is composed of discours- 
es delivered on these occasions, and written out after- 
wards as dictated by the author to an amanuensis. They 
had evidently been prepared with care in his own mind, 
and they contain a copiousness of language, a felicity of 
illustration, and a readiness in quoting and applying ap- 
propriate passages of Scripture, rarely to be witnessed. 
They were framed for a particular purpose, that of en- 
lightening and improving the less informed classes of 
society ; and whoever reads them will not wonder, that 
this purpose was atta ned, and that even those for whom 
the things of the world had attractions should resign for 
an hour the labour of gain, and listen with delight to the 
persuasive accents of the preacher. They may be read 
with prolit by all, who love to contemplate the work- 
ings of a powerful mind in recommending and enforcing 
the principles of a holy religion, who are captivated 
with the inventions of genius, the current of a natural 
eloquence, sound words uttered in the spirit of Christ- 
ian philanthropy, and sentiments breathing the influence 
of a rational, fervent piety 

The last works in which our author was engaged 
were the History of Baptism, and his Ecclesiastical i?e- 
6 



XIV LIFE OF ROBINSON. 

searches. These were also his hirgest works, each mak- 
ing a closely printed quarto volume. It had long been 
a source of regret among the Baptists, that no full and 
authentic history of their brethren existed, and that 
their opinions, character, and progress had never 
been represented to the world in the light they deserv- 
ed. It was at length resolved by some of the leading 
members of this denomination to supply the deficiency, 
and appoint a suitable person to write a copious and 
accurate history. The general voice fixed on Robinson, 
and in 1781 he was invited by an authorized committee 
to undertake the task. He complied with the request, 
and immediately set himself about the gigantic labour of 
wading through the ecclesiastical records of ancient and 
modern times, appalled neither by the lumber of anti- 
quity, nor the mountains of volumes, which have been 
raised by the prolific industry of later ages. 

That he might have a more ready access to scarce 
books, it was a part of his plan to reside a few days in 
every month in London. This design, however, was 
soon given up as impracticable, for so much was he 
sought after as a preacher, that he found his attention 
perpetually diverted from his studies. Appointments 
were made by his friends for preaching every day in 
the week, and so slowly did his history advance in the 
midst of these interruptions that he was glad to escape 
from them to his farm, his family, and his people, in 
the countrv. Here he was kindly favoured with books 
from the University, and occasionally from London, and 
here he completed the History of Baptism. 

This volume was chiefly printed before the author's 
death, but not published till after that event. It con- 
tains a vast fund of historical knowledge on the subject 
which he professes to treat, and indicates an uncommon- 
ly deep and patient examination. The " Ecclesiastical 
Researches" was a posthumous work, and having been 
left in an unfinished state, is in many respects imper- 
fect. It contains some curious facts relating to the his- 
tory of the existence and progress of the principles of 
religious liberty and a rational faith during the early 
periods of Christianity, and throughout the dark ages. 



LIFE OF ROBINSON. XV 

It proves, that these principles were never extinct in 
the gloomiest times, but that they were cherished in the 
hearts of a few sincere, secluded worshippers, who 
were either too remote from the public eje to be ob- 
served, or too insignificant to draw down upon them- 
selves the wrath of bigotry, or the rod of persecution. 
In this respect the Ecclesiastical Researches supplies a 
valuable link in the history of the church. But on the 
whole, neither this nor the History of Baptism, is equal 
to the author's other performances. While preparing 
them, it is evident his mind had lost much of its former 
vio'our, and was approaching that state of inefficiency, 
which it was the melancholy lot of his friends to con- 
template in the latter days of his life. However much 
the cause of truth may have gained by these works, 
they have added little to the authors fame. 

During the last year of Robinson's life, his health 
and his intellect gave symptoms of a rapid decline. Of 
this he appeared to be fully aware, for to a friend, who 
visited him not long before his death, he said, " You 
are come to see only the shadow of Robert Robinson." 
In the spring of 1790 he engaged to preach the charity 
sermons for the benefit of the dissenting schools at Bir- 
mingham. He left home on the second day of June in 
a languid frame of body and mind, but so well did he 
bear the fatigue of the journey, that he preached twice 
on the following sabbath. On monday evening he was 
taken ill, and his friends were alarmed ; but he gained 
strength the next day. He retired to rest late in the 
evening, after eating his supper with a good appetite, 
and by the ease and cheerfulness of his conversatiou re- 
lieving those around him from all apprehensions of im- 
mediate danger. But how frail are the foundations of 
human confidence, how deceitful the visions of human 
hope ! When the morning came he was found lifeless 
in his bed. His features were tranquil, and his spirit 
seemed to have deserted without a struggle its mortal 
tenement. His body was interred at Birmingham, and 
on the sabbath following a discourse adapted to the oc- 
casion was preached by Dr. Priestley. 

In theyear 1807, Mr. Flower published the J^f^5ceWa?^eow# 



XVi ' LIFE OF ROBINSON. 

Works of Robert Robinson, in four volumes, to which he 
prefixed a brief memoir of the author's life and writ- 
ings. This edition comprises all his works, except the 
History of Baptism, Ecclesiastical Researches, Village 
Discourses, and Notes to Claude. Among his best writ- 
ings are the prefaces to the several volumes of Saurin, 
especially the one on Christian Liberty. The Lite of 
Claude is well written, but a dissertation on Public 
Preaching, prefixed to the second volume of Claude's 
Essa^^, although it contains some novel thoughts, and 
valuable facts, is imperfect, and obviously put together 
from ill digested materials. This remark, indeed, ap- 
plies to several of his minor pieces, where a broader 
plan seems to have been laid, than his leisure and op- 
portunities allowed him to fill up. 

Among the numerous excellencies of Robinson's style, 
there are some glaring faults. His imagination is bril- 
liant and active, but it rambles without license, and lux- 
uriates without moderation. He never wants an appo- 
site figure to illustrate any position, but his choice is 
frequently ill-judged, and rests on low images unworthy 
of his subject. This may be accounted for, perhaps, 
from the circumstances of his education, and from his 
invariable habit of bringing down his language to the 
plain country people to whom he preached. Another 
fault is want of method, and looseness of reasoning. 
This fault is not perpetual, but it occurs too often. 
Logic was not his strongest point; he loved not that his 
fancy should be clogged and hampered by the trammels 
of the schools ; he chose a path of his own, and in his 
passion for freedom was impatient of the restraints 
which others have thought so wholesome a branch of 
discipline, and so useful in checking the exuberance of 
a prurient imagination, and maturing the decisions of a 
wayward judgment. It hardly needs to be added, that his 
taste partook of these defects ; it is sometimes bad, and 
often not to be commended. 

But these are small imperfections compared with the 
predominant features of Robinson's mind. The com- 
prehensive views which he took of every subject, the 
richness and abundance of his thoughts, the power Oi 



LIFE OF ROBINSON. XVU 

intellect which weighs in his sentences, the point of his 
expressions, the varied and playful, although erratic 
excursions of his imagination; and, above all, his sin- 
cerity and ardour, the justness of his sentiments, his un- 
disguised manner, his benevolence, charity, and Christ- 
ian temper, his independence and love of freedom, his 
unconquerable hostility to all religious domination under 
whatever name or character, his aversion to bigotry and 
narrowness, his adherence to the simple truths of the 
Gospel ; these give a charm and value to his writings, 
by which none can fail to be instructed and improved. 
Whoever would look for pleasure or benefit from the 
productions of a writer with traits like these, will find 
his labour well rewarded in perusing the works of Rob- 
ert Robinson. 



ADVERTISEMENT, 

PREFIXED TO THE EnGUSH EDITION, PRINTED AT HaRLOW, 1S05, 

Sixteen of the following Discourses were published 
by the Author. The seventeenth was printed in the 
Second edition^ from a Manuscript copy prepared by him 
for the press, but r^ot published during his life. 



PREFACE. 



The Protestant dissenting congregatior^^ at Cam- 
bridge, from the first forming of them, have always 
consisted, besides inhabitants of the town, of a great 
number of families, resident in the adjacent villages. 
In these last families there always have been children 
and servants, aged and infirm persons, who could at- 
tend the public worship in town only occasionally, 
some once a month on the Lord's Supper day, others 
once a quarter, and the very aged only once or twice 
in the summer. It hath therefore been the constant 
practice of their teachers, in compliance with their 
own desire, to instruct them at their own towns about 
once a month. In some there are houses fitted up on 
purpose ; and in others, barns in summer when they 
are empty, and in winter dwelling-houses, answer the 
same end. When either have been too small to ac- 
commodate the auditors, as they often have been oa 
fine evenings, sometimes they, and sometimes the 
teachers have stood abroad in an orchard, or a pad- 
dock, or any convenient place. The following dis- 
courses are a few of many which have been deliver- 
ed in such places. They are printed, as nearly as 
can be recollected, as they were spoken. 

In some places, and in some seasons the teacher 
hath tarried all night, and half an hour early in the 



iX PREFACE. 

morning- hath been employed in devotion and givino- 
instruction. The short discourses, called for distinct- 
ion sake Exercises, were delivered at such times. 
It was usual too, before sermon in the evening, to 
catechise the children, by hearing them read a short 
scripture history, and questioning them about the 
sense of it. 

The propriety of every action depends on circum- 
stances ; and nobody can judge of the fitness or unfit- 
fitness of a subject, or a part of a subject, or a manner 
of treating of it, except they who know all the cir- 
cumstances ; for the same method in different circum- 
stances would be unedifying, if not impertinent and 
rude. This publication therefore, is not intended 
either to blame or to direct any other teacher; but 
merely to gratify the long and importunate requests 
of some in the congregations who heard the discour- 
ses, and beyond whom we have neither inclination 
nor ambition to publish them. However, it will be 
necessary to apprize an occasional reader of ih-ee 
things ; for we do not love, and we think we do not 
deserve contempt. 

The first regards the subjects themselves. The 
author of these discourses is of opinion that the Christ- 
ian religion ought to be distinguished from the phi^ 
losophy of it. On this ground he studies to establish 
facts; and he hath no idea of guilt in regard to differ- 
ent reasonings on the nature of those facts, or the 
persons concerned in them. He hath his own opin- 
ions of the nature of God, and Christ, and man, and 
the decrees, and so on : but he doth not think that the 



PREFACE. XXI 

Opinion of Alhanasius, or Arius, or Sabellius, or Soci- 
nus, or Augustine, or Pelagius, or Whitby, or Gill, oa 
the subjects in dispute between them, ought to be 
considered of such importance as to divide Christians, 
by being made standards to judge of the truth of any 
man's Christianity. He thinks virtue and not faith 
the bond of union, though he supposes the subject 
ought to be properly explained. His design there- 
fore in these discourses was to possess people of a fuli 
conviction of the truth of a fe^v facts, the belief of 
which he thought would produce virtue, and along 
with that, personal and social happiness. His ideas 
of this subject do not meet the views of some of his 
brethren : but while he wishes they may enjoy their 
own sentiments, he hopes they will not deny him 
their friendship, because he hath it not in his power 
to think as they do. It is on supposition of the harm- 
lessness of philosophy, or rather of the benefit of get- 
ting into a sound philosophy, which is nothing but 
right reason, that he inculcates with all his might a 
spirit of universal liberty 5 for he never saw any dan- 
ger in a difference of opinion, till some unruly pas- 
sion, by disturbing the disputa:nts, and souring their 
tempers, brought the subject into disgrace. 

It is necessary also to observe in regard to a part 
of some subjects, that as there are various difficulties 
in the minds of different Christians arising from their 
different prejudices, it is but just in an assembly 
greatly diversified to give each one a solution of his 
own difficulty ; for otherwise the zest of the sermon 
is lost in regard to him, and that it ought not to be. 



XXll PREFACE. 

In an assembly of learned youths, whose faith in 
Christianity had been shaken by polished and be- 
witching recommendations of infidelity, it would be 
proper to take off the varnish, and discover the futil- 
ity and inconclusiveness of such essays ; and this ought 
to be done with wit, vivacity, ingenuity, address, and 
point, superior if it were possible in salt and savour 
to the style of unbelievers. On the contrary, in an 
assembly all made up of rustics, who never saw any 
charms in schools, whose ears are not accustomed to 
honeyed accents, and who have only vulgar preju- 
dices against Christianity, the method of recommend- 
ing it should be quite different. The objections of 
the learned lie against the supposed philosophy of 
Christianity, and point at what are called the doc- 
trines of it : but the objections of the uneducated are 
vulgar prejudices, which rise out of the love and the 
practice of sin. These people do not object against 
the doctrines ; indeed they are apt to err on the oth- 
er side, and to believe too much, sinking into a torpid 
state through credulousness as their opposites do 
through unbelief. They have no objection against 
any thing in the Gospel, except the virtue of it. To 
remove their prejudices against evangelical virtue is 
the peculiar work of their teachers. It is easy to see 
that either of these assemblies, taken separately, may 
be addressed with great propriety in their own way ; 
but should a few of the one sort mingle themselves in 
the assemblies of the other, it would become necessa- 
ry to treat them all with justice and respect, and con- 
sequently to direct a part^ a line or two, a sentence, 



PREFACE. XXlll 

a hint, a word, or an argument to the edification of 
each. Should it even not answer the end, the good 
intention of the teacher ought to be allowed. 

As to the manner of treating of the subjects of re- 
ligion, that ought to be formed as nearly as possible 
on the manners of the hearers. Indeed", what does it 
signify by what sounds, or by what sentences, or by 
what similitudes we set men a thinking, and convey 
information to their understandings ? From the mel- 
ody of a nightingale to the croaking of a frog, from 
the eloquence of Cicero to the vulgar gabble of Mrs. 
Quickly, the renowned hostess of the knight of inex- 
haustible humour, from the manly reasoning in But- 
ler's Analogy, to the doleful dialogues between Epe- 
netus, the devil, and Mr. Hobbes, all are, in some 
sense, indifferent. Many great . masters have given 
rules, which have their use to teach boys at school, 
how to practise a pace, which it may be proper for 
them to go in some even paths in future life : but there 
are some rugged roads in which rules would be an 
hindrance, and it may become necessary for travellers 
to scramble along as well as they can. The great 
end of teaching is to enable men to get above the 
want of teaching; and if that end be answered, the 
manner, it should seem, is an article of no very great 
consequence. 

Petilian had an only son, who disgraced his fami- 
ly, wasted his property, half broke his father's heart, 
and fled, all profligacy and diseases as he was, abroad. 
Petilian never forgot he had a son, often wept at re- 
collecting it, and grew grey with hoping against hope 



XXIV PREFACE. 

that he should live to clasp his penitent son in his 
arms. After twenty-five years, in which he had often 
been informed that his son was alive but become worse 
and worse, Rufus, a rough but honest and benevolent 
captain of a ship came to pay Petilian a visit ..." Par- 
don me, Petilian, if I ask, when you heard of your 
son" . . . The old gentleman took out his handkerchief 
and wiped his eyes ..." I can give you some intelli- 
gence of him," added Rufus, " and on the whole not un- 
pleasant" . . . Petilian looked hard at him, his jaw quiv- 
ered, he drew himself forward, and sat on the edge of 
the front of his chair . . . Rufus added, " He is become 
a Quaker" . . . Petilian lifted up one hand, the tears 
ran down from both his eyes, and he exclaimed, " Is he 
alive !" . . . " He is alive and well" ..." My son ! " . . . 
" Yes, your son, I have seen him and conversed with 
him, and what I tell you is true" . . . Petilian fainted. 
Rufus recovered him, and when he was cool told him : 
" I have been abroad. One day a shipwright, a rough 
blunt man, came on board, and told me that he had 
reproached your son with his conduct, in a manner so 
forcibly that he could not resist it, and that in conse- 
quence of the remonstrances of his own conscience, 
excited by his conversation, he had laid aside the 
practice, and quenched the love of vice, and that he 
now for four years past had lived a life of devotion, 
temperance, and justice. After his reformation he 
Jbad gone to work with this shipwright, and had mar- 
ried his daughter, and was led by that family into that 
jnode of Christianity, which we here call Quakerism, 
for the shipwright himself was a Friend, and held forth 



PREFACE. XXV 

on the nature and practice of virtue in a little assembly 
of his own people. I was curious to see him, and went 
with my informer on shore. There I found him, with 
his broad brim, eating his morsel with his Abigail, one 
of the neatest of women, and two children, the eldest 
of whom is the picture of yourself, and called friend 
Petilian, after thee. I proposed an interview with you, 
which he refused with tears of the most unaffected re^- 
pentance for his sins, and expressions of esteem for your 
virtue. He said, " I ought to ask pardon of my father, 
and I would, but, recollect. Captain, my father is a man 
of birth, fortune, and fashion, and of the Roman catholic 
religion. Thou wilt forgive me if I say, I fear the pre- 
iudices of that very virtuous man will not allow him to 
lake pleasure in me now that a change, so barbarous in 
his eye hath taken place in me ; for virtue, unaccompan- 
ied with the gaiety of the world and the ceremonies 
of the church, hath no being, much less beauty, in the 
eyes of such men. I think, therefore, on the whole, 
that it would be an act of cruelty to disturb the peace 
of my father ; perhaps he hath long ago buried me in 
imagination, and it would revive his grief to raise me 
from the dead. I trust, at the resurrection of the last 
day the infinite mercy of God will make the sight of me 
an addition to his joy" . . . Rufus paused . . . Petilian 
wept, and exclaimed, " O that I could see him ; proba- 
bly I might engage him to lay aside his garb of virtue 
without endangering his virtue itself" . . . " O no," said 
Rufus, " it would be dangerous to make the attempt ; 
beside, I can tell you he is an inconvertible man. You 
must either see him as he is, or never see him at all" . . . 



XXVI < PREFACE. 

" Is it possible to see him ?" . . . " It is. I have prevail- 
ed with him, and brought him and his family over" . . . 
"Holy virgin!" exclaimed Petilian. "Where is. he? 
I must see him. I have forgiven him. I feel I love 
him. I long to embrace him. I have already forgotten, 
and I will never recollect the impropriety of any means 
made use of to recover a sinner from the error of his 
way, and to fill a father with a joy like that of God, when 
he embraces a long lost, once prodigal, but now peni- 
tent son." '' Come then," said Rufus, " give passage to 
the finest emotions of the human heart. Your son saith, 
in language canonized by both your churches. Father, I 
have sinned against heaven, and before thee, and am no 
more worthy to be called thy son : make me as one of thy 
hired servants : and he is now saying this, all heretic 
as he is, in a room in this house where I have desired 
him to wait. You have compassion^ Petilian. Go, run 
fall on his neck and kiss him, and then let us all, in spite 
«f forms, eat and he merry, for 

" Pleasure and praise run through God's host 

To see a sinner turn ; 
Then Satan hath a captive lost, 

And Christ a subject born." 

To people who have any interest in the knowledge 
and virtue of their fellow-creatures, though it be not so 
o-reat as that of a parent, yet we cannot but think that 
all modes of communicating virtue are comparatively 
indifferent. Let the reader think of this, and forgive 
whatever may have tlie air, and in some cases the nr- 
lure, of impropriety, in these discourses, which were 
intended to edify many, and to give offence to none. 



CONTENTS. 



DISCOURSE I. 

Page. 
The Christian Religion easy to he understood, 1 

DISCOURSE II. 
Almighty God the lovely Father of all Mankind. 1 6 

DISCOURSE HI. 
We ought to he content with Providence, . . . .35 

DISCOURSE IV. 
The Scripture a Good Book^ written hy Divine" In- 
spiration 52 

DISCOURSE V. 
Jesus Christ the Principal Person mentioned in 

Scripture 76 

DISCOURSE VI. 
The Merit of Jesus Christ distinguishes him from 

all ether Persons ' 95 

DISCOURSE VII. 
Jesus Christ the most excellent of all Teachers . . 114 

DISCOURSE VIII. 
The Death of Jesus Christ obtained the Remission 

of Sins 137 

DISCOURSE IX. 
Jesus Christ the Governor of his Disciples. . * . 159 

DISCOURSE X. 
The Christian Religion should not be confounded 
with Heathenism 177 



XXVIU CONTENTS. 

DISCOURSE XI. 
The Christian Religion should not he mixed with 
that of the Jews 19^ 

DISCOURSE xn. 

Christians should behave properly to such as give 

Confused Accounts of Religion 218 

DISCOURSE XIII. 

The Spirit of God guides all Good Men 243 

DISCOURSE XIV. 
Faith and Holiness are inseparable, ..•..., 267 

DISCOURSE XV. 
Incorrigible Sinners will be without Excuse at the 

Last Day 291 

DISCOURSE XVI. 
Any Person, who understands Christianity, may 
teach it 317 

DISCOURSE XVII. 

jVo Man may punish Christ'' s Enemies hut himself 341 



MORNING EXERCISES, 

Exercise I. Industry 367 

II. Caution 377 

III. Frugality 385 

IV. Covetousness 390 

V. Self-preservation 395 

VI. The Jews 401 



DISCOURSE I. 

THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD, 

[AT DRY-DIUIYTON.I 

EPHESIANS iii. 4. 

When ye read^ ye may understand my knowledge in the 
mystery of Christ. 

Brethren, 

bupposE the apostle Paul, when he first stood up in the 
synagogue at Ephesus to teach Christianity to the Jews, or 
in the school of Tyrannus to a mixed assembly, had begun 
his discourse by saying, " Men of Ephesus, I am going to 
teach a religion which none of you can understand ;" I say, 
suppose this ; put yourselves in the place of the Ephesians, 
and you must allow, that he v/ould have insulted his hear- 
ers, disgraced himself, and misrepresented the religion of 
Jesus Christ. 

He would have insulted the assembly ; and they would 
have thought. This man either doth understand the subject 
of which he is going to speak, or he doth not. If he doth 
not understand it himself, he hath gathered us together 
only to hear him confess his ignorance ; and what have 
we to do with that ? If he be ignorant, let him sit silent 
as we do, and give place to such as do knov/ what they 
talk of. If he does undiferstand it himself, why should he 
affirm we cannot ? Are we assembled to hear him boast ? 
Does he take us for idiots, who have no reason, or for 
libertines, who make no use of what they have ? 

He would have disgraced himself; for what can render 
a man more ridiculous than his pretending to instruct 
others in what he doth not understand himself? Paul 
i 



2 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 

would have appeared in the pulpit just as one of you, 
taskers, would appear in the chair of a professor of He- 
brew at a university. What character more disgraceful 
can a man assume, than that of the leader of a credulous 
party, whose religion doth not lie in understanding and 
practising what is taught, but in believing that the teacher 
understands it ! A provision indeed for the glorious con- 
sequence of a blind guide ; but not for the freedom, and 
piety, and happiness of the people ! 

I said, he would have misrepresented the christian reli- 
gion ; and I am going to prove this, by showing you, that 
Christianity is not a secret but a revealed religion — that 
you are all of you able to understand it — and that there is 
every reason in the world why you should apply your- 
selves to the thorough knowledge of it. 

By Christianity, I mean that religion which Jesus Christ 
taught his disciples, and which is all contained in the New 
Testament. Retain this observation, for it frees the sub- 
ject from many difficulties. Some misguided Christians 
propose a great number of mysteries, that is, secrets to 
us ; such as that the bread and wine in the Lord's supper 
cease to be bread and wine, and become the flesh, and 
bones, and blood of Christ ; such as that a wicked man is 
inspired by the Holy Ghost to lead us to heaven without 
our knowing the way ; and that these wonders are per- 
formed by the uttering of certain words by a certain set 
of men ; and these secrets, which nobody so much as pre- 
tends to understand, we are required to believe. However, 
we have one short answer for all mysteries of this kind ; 
that is, they are not taught in the New Testament, and 
therefore they are no parts of the Christian religion. 

When I affirm the Christian religion is not a secret, ob- 
serve, I speak of Christianity now, and not formerly. Thus 
we free the subject from all the objections which are made 
against it from many passages in the New Testament. 
Christianity, say some, is often called a mystery, or a se- 
cret ; even the text calls it so. True ; but the same text 
says, Paul knew this secret, and the Ephesians might un- 
derstand what he knew of it, if they would read what he 
wrote to them. " When ye read, ye may understand my 
knowledge in the mystery of Christ." 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. & 

Strictly speaking, the text intends only one part of Chris- 
tianity, that is, the uniting of heathens and Jews in one 
religious community ; but what is affirmed of this one 
part is equally true of the whole. True religion had 
always been hid from the wisest of the heathens ; and the 
Christian religion, which was then the only true religion, 
had not been made know^n in other ages to the Jews, as it 
was then to the Apostles ; but Paul knew it, and he pro- 
posed to make all men see it. '^ I preach to make all men 
see." We allow, the wisest man could never have known 
(for his life would have been too short, and his faculties 
too much confined) the true character of God ; but we 
affirm, God revealed, that is, made it known unto the 
prophets and apostles by his Spirit ; and these prophets 
and apostles have made it known to us by their writings. 

When I affirm, the christian religion hath no mysteries 
now, I do not mean to say that the truths and the duties of 
Christianity are not connected with other truths and other 
exercises, w^hich surpass ail our comprehension ; but I af- 
firm, that the knowledge of the incomprehensible parts, and 
the belief of what people please to conjecture about them, 
though they may be parts of our amusement, and perhaps 
improvement, are yet no parts of that religion which God 
requires of us under pain of his displeasure. Suppose I 
were to affirm, there is no secret in mowing grass, and in 
making, stacking, and using hay ; all this would be very 
true ; and should any one deny this, and question me about , 
the manner in which one little seed produces clover, another 
trefoil, a third rye-grass, and concerning the manner how 
all these convey strength and spirit to horses, and milk to 
cows, and fat to oxen in the winter ; I would reply. All 
this is philosophy ; nothing of this is necessary to mowing, 
and making, and using hay. I sanctify this thought by ap- 
plying it to religion. Every good work produces present 
pleasure and future reward ; to perform the work, and to 
hope for the reward from the known character of the 
great Master we serve, is religion, and all before and 
after is only connected with it. 

What part of the christian religion is a mystery ? Di- 
vide the whole into the three natural parts, of plan^ pro- 
gress^ and execution ; the first was before this world be*- 



4 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 

gan ; the last will be after this world shall end ; the mid- 
dle part is before us now. There is no secret in either of 
these parts ; but there are incomprehensible mysteries 
connected with each of them. In regard to the first, it is 
impossible to be supposed, by a man who knows any thing 
of God, that the christian religion came into the world 
without the Creator's knowing that such an event would 
take place ; and it is impossible for such a man to imagine 
that, after the present life, there will be no distinction 
made between the righteous and the wicked. There is 
no mystery in these general principles ; but we may ren- 
der them extremely perplexed by rashly agitating ques- 
tions connected with them. 

In regard to Christianity in this present life, every thing 
in it is exceeding plain. Is the character of Jesus Christ 
a secret ? Did ever any body take him for an idle gen- 
tleman, a cruel tyrant, a deceitful tradesman, a man of 
gross ignorance and turbulent passions ? On the contrary, 
is it not perfectly clear that he was the person foretold by 
the prophets of his country, who should come, himself 
perfectly wise and good, to instruct mankind in the know- 
ledge and worship of God ? Is the character of Scripture 
a secret ? Is it not perfectly clear, that it is a wise and 
good book, full of information on all the subjects that con- 
cern religion and moralit}^ ? Is it a secret that we are 
mortal and must die ; or that we are depraved, and apt to 
live in the omission of duty and the practice of sin ; or 
that a life of sin is connected with a course of misery, for 
pursuing which we deserve blame ? Is it a secret wheth- 
er God takes notice of the actions of men, or whether he 
will forgive a penitent, and punish the impenitent ? In a 
word, is the character of God a secret in the christian re- 
ligion ; and is it a mystery whether he be an object wor- 
thy of our adoration and imitation ? Were I obliged to 
give a short account of the Christian Religion, I would not 
say it is a revelation of the decrees of God, or a revela- 
tion of the resurrection of the dead, or a revelation of the 
mercy of God to a repenting sinner through the merit of 
Jesus Christ; for though each of these be true, yet all 
these are only parts of his ways ; but I would call Chris- 
tianity a revelation, or a making known of the true and 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. O 

real character of God ; and I would affirm of the whole, 
and of each component part, that it was so made known as 
to be free from all mystery in regard to the truth of the 
facts, and yet so connected as to contain mysteries beyond 
the comprehension of finite minds. I would affirm further, 
that our religion is confined to the belief and practice of 
only what is revealed, and that every thing untold is a 
matter of conjecture, and no part of piety towards God, and 
benevolence to mankind. 

Take heart, then, my good brethren ; you may under- 
stand, practise, and enjoy all this rich gift of God to man, 
just as you enjoy the light of the day, and refreshment by 
rest at night. Let no one saj^, I was born in poverty, I 
have had no learning, I have no friends, my days are spent 
in labour, and I have no prospect except that of drawing 
my last breath where I drew m}^ first. All this may be 
true ; but all this will not prevent your knowing, and prac- 
tising, and enjoying the Christian Religion, the founder of 
which had not, what the birds of the air have, " where to 
la}^ his head." 

When I say all may understand it, I mean, if their own 
depravity does not prevent it. Plainly, you cannot know it 
if you do not attend to it ; nor can you know it though you 
do attend, if you do not attend to Christianity itself, and 
not to something else put instead of it. Let me explain 
myself. 

One says, I cannot understand the nature and force 
of religion ; and pray, is there any thing wonderful 
in your ignorance ? Consider, you never read the Scrip- 
tures ; you never ask any body to read them to you ; you 
hate and persecute good men ; you seldom enter a place 
of worship ; you keep wicked company like yourself; you 
are often seen in the practice of enormous crimes. Are 
you the man to complain, " I cannot understand religion ?" 
It would be a mystery indeed, if a man who never turned 
his attention to a subject, should know any thing certain 
about it. We have no such mystery in all the christian 
religion. Christians do not live like you. 

Another says, I am a very sober man, I go constantly to 
a place of worship, and I cannot comprehend fhe christian 
religion. All this is very true ; you are a sober, decei>t 
1* 



6 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOODo 

character, and regular in your attendance on public wor- 
ship ; but recollect, I am speaking not of your body, but 
of your mind. Now, it is a fact, abroad or at home, in the 
church or in the barn, your attention is always taken up 
with other things, and so taken up as to leave no room 
for " the things which belong unto your everlasting ipe&.ce.''^ 
Sometimes your corn, sometimes your cattle, sometimes 
taxes and rates, and sometimes your rent and your ser- 
vants' wages ; but, at all times, to live in the present 
world, engrosses all your attention. You, you resemble 
yon child fast asleep, without knowing it, in the arms of a 
parent. " God besets you behind and before, and lays his hand 
upon you. It is he that watereth the ridges of your corn, and 
settleth the furrows thereof; he maketh the earth soft with 
showers; he clothes thy pastures with flocks, and crowns the 
year with his goodness. It is he that giveth thee power to get 
wealth, andmultiplieth thy herds and thy flocks, and thy sil- 
ver and thy gold, and all that thou hast." And you, inatten- 
tive man ! you cannot comprehend that you are under an 
obligation to know and do the will of this generous bene- 
factor. What does Christianity require of you but to love 
and serve this God ? If you do not serve him, it is be- 
cause you do not iove him ; if you do not love him, it is 
because you do not know him ; and if you do not know 
him, it is not for want of evidence, but attention. 

It is not only to you that I affirm this connexion between 
attention and knowledge ; for if this barn were filled with 
statesmen and scholars, generals and kings, I should be al- 
lowed to say to one, Sir, you understand intrigue ; to 
another, Sir, you understand war, to besiege a town, and 
rout an army ; to a third, Sir, you understand law, and 
every branch of the office of a conservator of the peace ; 
to another. Sir, you understand languages and arts and 
sciences ; and you all understand ail these, because you 
have studied them ; but here are two things which 3'^ou 
have not studied, and which therefore you do not know ; 
the one, how to plough, and sow, and reap, and thresh an 
acre of wheat ; and the other how to live holily in this 
world, so as to live happily in the world to come. Are 
you not convinced, my good brethren, that the same cir- 
cumstance, which prevents those gentlemen from knowing 
how to perform the work that you perform every day 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 7 

with pleasure, prevents you from knowing the practice 
and the pleasure of true Christianity ? In both cases the 
subject hath not been attended to. 

I go further, and venture to affirm, if religion could be 
understood without attention, it would be a misfortune ; a 
misfortune depriving us of many advantages and leading us 
to commit many crimes. The ease with which we ac- 
quired knowledge would sink the value of it, and " dark- 
ness would have communion with light." 

As attention is absolutely necessary, so it is equally ne- 
cessary that attention should be fixed upon the christian 
religion itself, and nothing else. We hear often of the 
mysteries of religion ; let us not forget that there are myste^ 
ries of iniquity. Ignorance, covetousness, tyranny, especially 
tyranny over conscience^ all wrap themselves in mystery ; but 
if we incorporate any of these mysteries with the christian 
religion, and attend to them, instead of distinguishing and 
attending to pure Christianity, we may attend and study, 
but we shall never know ; we shall be ever learning, and 
never able to come to the knowledge of the truth. The doc- 
trine, manner of life, purpose, faith, longsuffering, charity, 
patience, persecutions, afflictions, and deliverances of the 
apostle Paul, were fully known.) and diligently followed by 
common Christians ; but who ever knew the doctrine of 
transubstantiation, or that of the infallibility of a frail, sin- 
ful man ? Who of us, uninspired men, knows the feelings 
of a person under the immediate influence of the Holy 
Ghost ? In vain we pursue such mysteries as these ; the 
stronger the attention, the greater the mortification of not 
being able to succeed. If one place religion in impulses, 
another in new revelations, a third in a state of perfection, 
a fourth in discoveries and enjoyments inconsistent with 
our present state, and not set before us in the christian re- 
ligion, they may well be filled with doubts and fears, and 
spend life in complaining of the crooked and dreary paths 
of religion. If, on the contrary, we attend only to what 
is revealed, to believe only what is reported with suffi- 
cient evidence, to practise only what is commanded by the 
undoubted voice of God ; if we seek only such pleasures 
and 'distinctions as we are taught in scripture to expect ; 
in a word, if we would acquaint ourselves only with God^ 



8 f HE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 

and be at peace one with another, thereby g-ood should 
Come unto us. 

When I said, all of you might understand Christianity, I 
meant, there was nothing in Christianity but what might 
be understood if it were properly attended to, and nothing 
in the natural condition of any individual (I do not say his 
moral state), to prevent his attending to it. There is no 
capacity so mean, no creature so forlorn, as to be beyond 
the reach of the benefits conferred upon men by Jesus 
Christ. You are a babe ; in his gospel there is " milk for 
babes ;" truths adapted to nourish and cherish a little, fee- 
ble mind. You are poor ; " the poor have the gospel preach- 
ed to them ;" the glad tidings of a Redeemer, and all his bene- 
fits. You are unlearned ; but the '' highway of holiness" is so 
plain, that the "way-faring man, though a fool, shall not err 
therein." You are so bashful, and so unused to company, that 
you are necessarily deprived of the pleasure of the com- 
pany and conversation of good men ; but you have better 
company than that of good men ; and you, you poor shep- 
herd, you will behold the heavens, the work of the fingers 
of your God ; you will consider the moon and the stars, and 
the Saviour and the heaven which he hath ordained, till 
you cry out, " What is man that thou art mindful of him, and 
the son of man that thou visitest him?" And upon these sub- 
jects " the tongue of the stammerer shall be ready to speak 
eloquently !" The Christian religion enlarges and ennobles 
the mind, purifies and refines the heart, and adorns the 
life ; and a Christian labourer, exercising his own under- 
standing, is a more beautiful sight than an unjust judge in 
all the pomp of his office. 

Let us finish, by remarking the reasons that should in- 
duce you to apply to religious knowledge. There are 
reasons in God — reasons in the christian religion — reasons 
in the world — and reasons in yourselves ; and if all these 
reasons be not sufficient to prevail with you to love and 
serve God, reason will require but one thing more, that is, 
'' your everlasting destruction from the presence of the 
Lord, and from the glory of his power, when he shall be 
revealed from heaven, with his mighty angels, in flaming 
fire, to punish them that know not God, and that obey not 
the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. \) 

Do not think I mean to frighten 5^ou. Fear is one of 
the lowest passions ; and though " the fear of the Lord is" in 
some men " the beginning of wisdom," yet it is not the whole 
of it. Consider God. Is there nothing in him to engage 
3^ou to esteem him ? Can your mind be so drenched in 
sin as to dislike a being of perfect wisdom, justice, good- 
ness, and power ? Hath he no right ov,er you by creating 
and preserving you ? Is there nothing in all the tender 
compassion of the Gospel worth j^our regard ? His pro- 
mises, are they not worthy of your desires ? His threat- 
enings, is there nothing in them that you ought to fear ? 
God is the chief example, and the first reason of holiness. 
If we wish to please him, it must be by making him, the 
sovereign beauty, the first cause of all things, the chief 
object of our esteem ; and if we esteem him, we must take 
pleasure in every thing that represents him. If the glo- 
rious perfections of God shine in the face of Jesus Christ, 
we shall reverence Jesus Christ. If the Scriptures be a 
^picture, so to speak, of this parent, whose face none of his 
children can see in this life, we shall study the Holy 
Scriptures. If " the heavens declare his glory," if " the, 
earth be full of his praise," we shall see God in every thing, 
and in every thing shall discover a reason for obeying him. 
Oh how full of preachers is this well adjusted world ! Had we 
attention equal to our means of instruction, how wise and 
good should we become ! The twittering of a sparrow, 
the chirping of a grasshopper, the music of a May morning, 
and the whistling of winter winds, speech that showeth knowl- 
edge to the end of the world, would sound in the ears of man, 
make the simple wise, and compel him to say, " The statutes 
of the Lord are right," and " more to be desired than much 
fine gold ; sweeter also than honey, or the honey-comb." 

When this " God so loved the world as to give his only 
begotten Son, that whosoever believed in him should not 
perish, but have everlasting life," he commanded the " an- 
gels of God to worship him :" he said, by a voice from heav- 
en, both to the apostles alone, and to the whole multitude 
of the Jews with them, " This is my beloved son, hear ye 
him." He declared by the mouth of an inspired man, 
" This is the Prophet whom the Lord your God hath raised 
up unto you ; him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever 



10 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 

he shall say unto you. And it shall come to pass, that eve- 
ry soul which will not hear this Prophet, shall be destroyed 
from among the people." Remark this expression, " every 
soul — every soul that will not hear this Prophet, shall be 
destroyed from among the people." 

Why ? Is this an arbitrary command ; as much as to say, 
you shall be Christians ; and I your God will have it so ? 
No such thing ; butbecause the christian religion is the per- 
fection of reason, and intended to explain and establish the 
three branches of the eternal and unchangeable law of nature. 

The first of these is pieiy towards God. Doth God re- 
quire us to fear, to love, to trust, to obey, to worship him ? 
He hath displayed himself in the christian religion as most 
worthy of all this worship. He hath removed all the sus- 
picions of heathens, by express declarations of his mind 
and will. He hath taken away all the horrors excited by 
apprehensions of danger, from the guilty bosoms of men, 
by suitable promises, and by signal proofs of his kind at- 
tachment to their being and happiness. Doth he require 
us to believe ? It is upon evidence. Doth he require us 
to obey ? He condescends to set us an example, by a 
thousand acts of justice and generosity. 

A second branch of righteousness is, love to our neighbours. 
The christian religion is the highest reason for this just 
esteem; for thus it argues, "If God so loved us, we ought al- 
so to love one another." If any of our fellow-creatures ren- 
der themselves so odious by sin, that they cease to be ob- 
jects of esteem, the Gospel teaches us to consider them as 
objects of pity, and sums up all morality in one word, " All 
things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do 
ye even so to them ; for this is the law and the prophets." 

The third part of righteousness is to love ourselves ; and 
the christian religion, by declaring the immortality of the 
soul, the resurrection of the body, and the whole appoint- 
ment of man to be a " temple of the Holy Ghost," an " hab- 
itation of God through the spirit," lays us under the strongest 
obligations to " live soberly in this present world." The 
christian religion, too, gives us 'c\\e irresistible motives of the 
love of God, the example of the death of Christ, the last 
judgment, hell with all its horrors, and heaven with all its 
pleasures, as reasons why we should " work out our own 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 11 

salvation' with fear and trembling." There is, therefore, 
in the christian religion itself the highest reason for our 
acceptance of it. 

There are reasons in theti^'or^ that surrounds you, for 
your attending to the christian religion. Consider four 
sorts of men, in a manner four worlds, more strictly four 
different views of the same world, and from each derive 
instruction. Observe, first, that great multitude of men, 
who live in the constant practice of sin, drunkards, liars, 
thieves, extortioners, and all the rest of that black list, 
who are expressly, by name, as it were, doomed not to in- 
herit the kingdom of God. Is there any thing to tempt a 
man of sense and reason to live as thej^ do ? Is it a desir- 
able thing to die as they die ? And would you v.ish to be 
a companion of such odious monsters in a future state of 
punishment ? The christian religion calls you out of this 
company, and finds you other work and different wages. 

Look next at the prosperous part of the world. See 
with what hazard they get, with what angujsh they keep, 
and with what agony they part with the good things of this 
life ; the reason is, they have mistaken the nature of these 
things, they take them for their chief good, and part with 
them as if they were torn from Almighty God. Even in- 
nocent prosperity is a temptation to guilt, and the down bed 
of success is apt to make men sleep when they should 
wake, and waste that life in idleness, which was intended 
for action. That religion which teaches us how to use 
the world without abusing it, and how to " lay up treasures 
in heaven ;" that religion which preserves the heart from 
taking damage by a plentiful harvest, a prosperous trade, 
and such other little advantages of life ; that is the reli- 
gion, which, if we were sure of prospering in all our un- 
dertakings, we ought first of all to embrace, lest the end 
of a prosperous life should be a miserable death, as that 
of all, who are wicked in prosperity, must necessarily be. 

Remark the afflicted part of the world. The poor, the 
lame, the blind, the deaf, the dumb, the man in prison for 
his debts, and the man in an hospital with his sores, the 
poor father reduced to live upon charity through the ex- 
travagance of his son, the grey-headed, lame, and shriv- 
elled mother, left and forgotten, neglected and insulted by 



12 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 

her proud children, who have prospered in the world ; 
look at the man afflicted with the gravel, and dying by 
inches, and ask what can support the spirits of all this 
company, except religion ? What but the prospect of a 
future state of happiness can administer a sufficient relief 
to them ? The christian religion is a general balm to 
heal all their wounds. It teaches the doctrine of Provi- 
dence, that God brings good out of evil, and communicates 
the greatest blessings to mankind, under appearances the 
most mortifying to our sense:.-. Observe, finally, the reli- 
gious world, the good people gone before, and the rest 
now on the road. That religion, which supported Job 
under all his adversity ; that religion which kept Joseph 
from losing his soul in prosperity ; that religion, which 
held the arm of David from making an unjust use of the 
sword of the magistrate, and kept the line abilities of Paul 
from serving the interests of sin ; that religion, which 
saved Peter from distraction and despair ; that religion, 
which ever}'^ day suppresses so much sin, binds up so ma- 
ny broken hearts, produces so many just and generous ac- 
tions, communicates so much pleasure through life, and " a 
joy unspeakable and full of glory" at the hour of death ; — that 
is the religion, which my own reason commands me to re- 
ceive. There are reasons in yourselves, in your nature — 
in your depravity — in your condition — and in your pros- 
pects. Your nature is capable of high improvement. By 
becoming a good christian, you will improve your body, 
even here ; for temperence, sobriety, chastity, industry, 
and, above all, the government of the temper, that calm- 
ness, which religion produces, is "the health of the counte- 
nance ;" and at the resurrection of the dead, religion will 
change the natural into a spiritual body ; " corruptible shall 
put on incorruption, mortal immortality, and then shall be 
brought to pass the saying that is written. Death is swallowed 
up in victory." Your souls also are capable of great ad- 
vancement. Have you no ambition to know more than 
how to manage a few acres of land, how to dispose of a 
little corn, or a little money ? Rise, men ! rise into an 
apprehension of your dignity. You were made in the im- 
age of God ; and though the picture is dirtied and de- 
faced, yet Christianity calls you to aspire to such noble 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 13 

sentiments and worthy actions, such high enjoyments, and 
such duration, as become the majesty of your nature. 
Hear the great master : When good men " rise from the 
dead, they neither marry, nor are given in marriage ;" 
and we may venture to add, they neither sow nor reap, 
buy nor sell, build nor adorn ; but, far, far above all these 
little things, " are as the angels which are in heaven." 

Think of your depravity. Are you perfectly reconciled 
to your own sins, to wilful ignorance ; would you always 
be a fool ? To discontent ; would you always be gloomy 
and apt to despair ? Are you quite easy with anger and 
malice, and are you never afraid that the violence of your 
passions may bring you to shame here, and to hell hereaf- 
ter ? But without religion, they will bring you to " shame 
and everlasting contempt." 

Attend a moment to your condition ; every thing in that 
is a reason for religion, lou are a father: would you 
go, at the head of a family of eight or ten children, a 
guide to hell ? You are poor : and is not a poor man 
without religion comfortless in himself, and offensive to 
others ? Is there any encouragement to the rich to 
find you work, or to give you charity, if you consume all 
in the service of sin ? 

Such of you as are young should remember, that a youth 
without religion is a dangerous person : and such of you 
as are old should remember, that sober people always con- 
sider an old man teaching others, by his example, to sin, 
as a public nuisance. Such as are in health should not 
abuse those precious days : such as are sick should im- 
prove every moment in " preparing to meet their God," the 
judge that standeth before their door. 

This brings us to the last article, your prospects. It was 
a very alarming question, which the prophet Jeremiah 
put to his countrymen, after he had described the wicked 
state in which they lived. " The prophets prophesy falsely, 
the priests bear rule by their means, and my people love to 
have it so." There can be no worse state of a people than 
this. The prophets might say any thing, true or false, so 
that these wretched people might be released from the 
trouble of examining, and be left to pursue every one his 
own sinful pleasure. The priests might do anv thing, in- 
2 



14 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. 

troduce idolatry instead of the worship of the true God, 
practise every crime instead of exemplifying every vir- 
tue, on condition they would let this base people share 
their guilty enjoyments. Miserable people ! you love to 
have it 50, in the time of a Jeremiah too, and when the en- 
emy is just at your gates, and the judgments of God, hang- 
ing like a thick cloud, just ready to overwhelm you with 
misery ! You love to have it so ; so did not Abraham your 
father : but you keep bad company, and place a supersti- 
tious confidence in your profligate guides ! " If a man say, 
I will prophesy unto you of wine and of strong drink, even he 
shall be the prophet of this people !" But what says your 
compassionate friend Jeremiah ? He asks this alarming 
question, " What will you do in the end thereof?" Suppose 
this prophet to return to the world again, pity you as he 
did the people of his own times, meet you in some of your 
walks, look steadfastly at you, and with tears running down 
his cheeks, gently ask you, '' What will you do in the end 
thereof?" Are you wiser than the old world, who lived as 
you do, while Noah was building and entering the ark, and 
knew not till " the flood came and swept them all away ?" 
Will you provoke the Lord to jealousy ? are you stronger 
than he ? What will yoii do in the end? I defy you to give 
an answer that will not be a reason for your immediate 
attention to Christianity. If that punishment, which is at 
the end of your path, and is in full prospect all the way, 
be before your eyes, you will instantly " make supplication to 
your judge," that you " come not into that place of torment :" 
if, on the contrary, you have repentance, forgiveness, and 
heaven in prospect, you will be confounded for your in- 
gratitude to that benefactor, from whom you live in hopes 
of receiving such undeserved favours. 

Brethren, if there be in you the least degree of self- 
love, or the fear of God ; if you have not lived in sin till 
your understandings are blasted and perished, I conjure 
you, respect the Apostle of us Gentiles, who now sa3'^s to 
us, " If you read, you may understand my knowledge in the 
mystery of Christ." Tell him, if you have the heart, We will 
not read, nor will we hear any body else read the book 
that contains the christian religion. Religion is the last 
thing we desire to understand, and we prefer a newspaper 



THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION EASY TO BE UNDERSTOOD. lb 

and a ballad, before all your histories and prophecies, and 
epistles and gospels. If this be your case, when heathens 
are pitied, some of whom went half over the then known 
world in pursuit of wisdom, but never saw the wisdom of 
God in the Christian religion ; I say, when you and they 
stand at the judgment-seat of Christ, to receive for the 
deeds done in the body, their condition will be more tol- 
erable than yours. 

Oh ! may that God " whose tender mercies are over all his 
works, who desireth not the death of a sinner, but that he 
should return and live," inform your minds, by means of 
our instructions, and so " may he enlighten the eyes of 
your understanding, and give you the spirit of wisdom and 
revelation, that you may know what is the hope of his call- 
ing, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in 
the saints !" When you come to die, may he " show you 
the path of life ;" and in the world to come may you " see 
him face to face, and know even as also you are known !" 



DISCOURSE II. 

ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIJv'©. 

[AT GRAJVC HESTER.] 

LUKE xi. 2. 

When ye pray^ say^ Our Father. 

Luther, that great reformer of religion in German}^, 
about two hundred and fifty years ago ; Luther was one 
day catechising some country people in a village in Saxo- 
ny. When one of the men had repeated these words, " I be- 
lieve in God the Father Almighty," Luther asked him what 
was the signification of Almighty ? The countryman hon- 
estly replied, "• I do not know." " Nor do I know," said 
Luther, " nor do all the learned men in the world know : 
however, you may safely believe that God is your Father, 
and that he is both able and willing to protect and save 
yourself, and all your neighbours." The reformer might 
have added, that '^ no man had seen God at any time ;" that 
no man had '•' either heard his voice, or seen his shape ;" that, 
when Moses said to God, '' I beseech thee show me thy glo- 
ry," the answer was, '' thou canst not see my face, for 
there shall no man see me and live ;" and that all the display's 
of God, by his works, in the eyes of men, were rather a " hid- 
ing of his power," than a discoveryof it. Yes, my brethren, 
" the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord 
of lords, who alone hath immortality, dweileth in the light 
lyhich no man can approach unto ; and him no man hath 
seen nor can see." It was wise, therefore, in Luther not to 
pretend to teach what neither the countrym.an, nor him- 
siclf, nor all the men in the world understood ; and he had 
the advantage of the best examples to justify the method 
he took ; that is, to allow what all mankind are obliged to 
allow, that there is a God 5 that God hath all possible per- 



ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. i7 

fections, is perfectly wise, perfectly just, perfectly good, 
too wise to do any thing wrong, too good to do any thing 
unkind ; and that all these perfections are the guardians, 
protectors, and friends of every good man. 

Moses began to write the Holy Scriptures, but he did 
not begin by attempting to prove there was a God ; but, 
taking this for granted, the first line he wrote was this, "Ip 
the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." When 
the same Moses besought God to show him his glorify 
meaning by that himself^ God said, " I will make all my good- 
ness pass before thee :" and, on the same principles, when 
one of the disciples of Jesus Christ said unto him, Lord^ 
teach us to pray^ Jesus, who was with God^ and knew God, 
and came from God^ said unto them, When ye pray^ say.^ 
What ? Jehovah, First Cause, Supreme Being, co-equal, 
co-essential ? No : but, when ye pray, say. Our Father. 

In order to enter into the spirit of our subject ; that is, 
so to know God as to love and obey him, we will endeav- 
our ... to take off some of the veils which conceal our 
heavenly Father ... to examine the representations which 
he hath given us of himself . . . and to apply the whole to 
the improvement of our hearts, and the amendment of our 
lives. " Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy 
name ; thy kingdom come ; thy will be done, as in heaven, so 
in earth ; forgive us our sins ; and lead us not into the tempt- 
ation" of thinking meanly and wickedly of thee ; but de- 
liver us from all the evil notions of God which ignorant and 
vicious men entertain, and to this end condescend to bless 
the good word which we are now going to hear. 

My brethren, if you desire to form just notions of xA.lmighty 
God, lay aside all creatures. Your Father, who is in heav- 
en, is not earth, water, air, light ; he is not gold, silver, 
precious stones ; he is not fire, a star, a sun ; he is not a, 
man ; he is not any of these apart ; he is not all these put 
together ; he is not great or little, tall or low, round or 
square ; he is not white or red, or of any colour ; he is 
not to be smelted, tasted, felt, weighed, or measured. All 
these are his works ; but none of these is himself Your 
forefathers, like all other uninstructed people in the world, 
made images to represent God ; and, as they could not 
-think of any one thing sufficient to describe even what lit- 



18 ALMIGHTt GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 

tie they knew of God, they endeavoured to represent one 
of his excellencies by one iniage, and another by another, 
till they were multiplied beyond reckoning ; and, as they 
paid that respect to such images, which was due to none 
but Almighty God, the images were called idols^ and the 
people idolaters^ who amidst all their gods and lords, were 
^without God in the world." 

Suppose an old Briton, one of your fathers, about two 
thousand years ago, to have fallen blind, and to have lost 
the use of his limbs, so that he could neither see nor feel 
the parish idol ; yet if he, lying in his bed, or sitting over 
his fire, remembered the form of the idol, and felt respect 
for it in his heart, should we not have reason to say he 
was an idolater ? Now this may be your case ; for if you 
think of God under any form, and respect that form as 
God, though you cannot produce any likeness of the form 
in your mind, yet this idea of God will become a veil 
thrown over your understanding, and will prevent your 
entertaining just notions of Almighty God. This you must 
lay aside, if you desire to know God. 

In like manner, if you would form just notions of Al- 
mighty God, you must lay aside all the similitudes of Scrip- 
ture^ under which the inspired writers speak of God. I 
exact nothing of you in this respect, but what you your- 
selves perform every day in other respects. You sa}^, A 
sharp man, with a sharp scythe, on a sharp morning, with 
a sharp appetite, mowed an acre of grass before break- 
fast, which was sharp work : but you mean, an ingenious 
man, whose scythe had a keen edge, early in the morning, 
while it was yet cold, and though he was all the while 
very hungry, cut an acre of grass before breakfast, which 
was hard work. Now why do you use the same word to 
express vv^it, cold, hunger, hardship, which properly sig- 
nifies only the fine edge or point of a tool ? You do so, 
because you have more thoughts than words to express 
them, and because there is some one general likeness in 
which all these things agree ; and as you understand one 
another, there is no danger ; for you lay aside, when you 
hear of a sharp appetite, the ideas of edge, wit, cold, hard- 
ship, and understand hunger. 

Lf words be too few and too poor to express other sub- 



J^LMIGflTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 19 

jects, they must, for a much stronger reason, be fewer and 
poorer to describe Almighty God. The Scriptures, there- 
fore, are to be read with this caution. They speak of the 
eyes, and hands, and teet of God ; they speak of the heart, 
and the anger, and the love of God ; they speak of God's 
waking, and watching, and going, and coming ; and yet 
there is in God no parts of head or hands, no passions of 
hatred or anger, no motion from a place where he was, to 
a place where he was not before. Take our text for an 
example. God is called s. father^ not because he is in the 
form, or shape, or any thing like the person you call fa- 
ther ; so that when you pray to God, you must not think 
of him as one in the form of your father. In like man- 
ner, God hath not such passions as your father hath ; no- 
thing like his anger, nor any feelings like what you call 
love in your father : he is not, like him, sometimes full of 
affection, at other times displeased and angry, sometimes 
more kind^ and sometimes more angry than at other times. 
What is called love in God doth not make him go and 
come, and so on ; for none of these things agree with the 
spiritual, independent, and unchangeable perfection of God. 
If therefore we would entertain just notions of God, we 
must lay aside all similitudes, even those which the pov- 
erty of language made it necessary for inspired men to 
use. 

Further, having rent the veil of gross matter, and that 
of resemblance or similitude, you must, in order to form 
right notions of God, lay aside a partial view of him. I 
will explain myself (and let it not surprise you, if I be at 
a loss for words plain enough to bring down this subject to 
the size of our understandings). A partial view of any 
thing is such a view as a man takes of an object too big 
for his eyes to take in at once. For example ; if a man goes 
up a hill to see the town of Cambridge, he will indeed 
see the town ; that is to say, one side of the town ; and if 
he would see the whole town, he must go from place to 
place all round it, from street to street ail through it ; and 
every step would bring him to see some part of the town 
which he had not seen before. Thus every one of us hath 
seen Cambridge, and no one of us hath seen Cambridge ; 
we have all seen it partially. In like manner, if a man 



20 ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 

would see how wheat grows, it would not be enough t<> 
see it in January ; for this would be a partial sight ; but 
he must watch it from seed-time till harvest. Apply this 
to our subject. We speak of God. God is a great Being, 
and this world is a very little part of his empire ; and the 
whole of God is from everlasting to everlasting. When 
therefore we speak of the justice of God, the goodness of 
God, the power of God, we speak partially, according to 
the little views we have of acts that appear just, and good, 
and powerful ; but we should not be such children as to 
think that God lays aside what we call one perfection, 
when he exercises another ; that he is more kind in har- 
vest than he is in December ; that he is more powerful 
in a tempest than he is in a calm day ; that he is merciful 
when we recover from a sickness, and cruel when we die 
of it. Strictly speaking, there are not more perfections 
in God than one, that is a general excellence, a love of 
order : in this he agrees with our idea of a father, who 
nourishes, cherishes, feeds, clothes, instructs, corrects, and 
protects his child, intending by all to make him happy by 
making him holy. 

I wish I knew how to make this subject so plain, par- 
ticularly the last article mentioned, that you might not 
mistake it. The excellence of instruction is not that it 
may be understood, but that it cannot be misunderstood. 
There was lately a man executed at Cambridge, for rob- 
bing and murdering one of your neighbours. Was the ex- 
ecution of this man a judgment or a mercy, an act of jus- 
tice or an act of kindness ? We call it the just judgment 
of the law upon this criminal. It was so : but was it not 
also an administration of kindness and mercy ? Perhaps to 
the man ; for it might save him from a hotter place in 
hell, which he might have deserved, had he gone unpun- 
ished here, by robbing and murdering twenty more of you. 
Perhaps, too, the process of justice, from his apprehen- 
sion to his death, might bring him to repentance ; and 
certainl}^ it was an act of mercy to us, as well as to other 
people disposed to rob and murder us, but who may be 
deterred by this example. An unthinking man at this ex- 
ecution, especially if he had, like too many, been drink- 
ing to cheer his spirits before he saw the dismal sight, 



ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 21 

would have wondered, had any one on the spot exclaimed, 
Oh the goodness and mercy ! Oh the excellent compassion 
of the laws of England ! Apply this to our subject, and 
always remember, that the most terrible dispensations of 
Almighty God are as kind in one view as they are dread- 
ful in another : that the greatest profusions of his good- 
ness are as just in one view as they are kind in another ; 
and that when we speak of one perfection of God, we al- 
ways mean all the rest, and speak thus only to adapt this 
great subject to the littleness of our minds. 

It is to this littleness of mind that God condescends to 
adapt himself We are taught in the text to consider God 
as our Father. As a wise and good father he instructs his 
children, and, strictly speaking, every benefit which God 
bestows on us is intended to give us an education. If we 
be nourished by our food, warmed by our clothes, cor- 
rected by our afflictions, and protected from our enemies, all 
these are for the sake of instructing us, that so by knowl- 
edge and virtue we may be trained up, and fitted and pre- 
pared to live in heaven. For this purpose God hath laid 
open before us, so to speak, four books, in each of which 
he is represented as the Father and Friend of man. 

The first is the book of Creation ! "• Heavens that de- 
clare the glory of God ; a firmament that sheweth his han- 
dy work ; days and nights teaching knowledge ;" a whole 
world to make us understand " his eternal power and God- 
head," and to inform us that the Father of spirits is the Fa- 
ther of the rain, and the Father of all our mercies, and all 
our comforts of every kind. Read the two first chapters 
of Genesis, the book of Job, the hundred and fourth Psalm, 
the fortieth chapter of Isaiah, and other passages of scrip- 
ture, which describe the world in which we live ; and ex- 
pounding what you read by what you see in the world, 
acknowledge that the wisdom and goodness of God to man 
are laid open in a manner so clear, as to fill us with a 
conviction that he is, and that he is the object of our chief 
confidence and esteem, '' a rewarder of them that diligent- 
ly seek him." It is he that " giveth to all nations of men 
life, and breath, and all things." It is he that " determined 
our times, and appointed the bounds of our habitation." It 
is he " in whom we live, and move, and have our beings" 



22 ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 

and we " are his offspring," the offspring of God. It is he 
who is " not far from every one of us." To use the lan- 
guage of an Apostle, let us '' feel after him, if haply we 
may find him." 

See here, I hold a Bible in my hand, and you see the 
cover, the leaves, the letters, and the words ; but you do 
not see the writers or the printers, the letter-founder, the 
ink-maker, the paper-maker, or the binder. You never 
did see them, you never will see them, and yet there is not 
one of you who will think of disputing or denying the being 
of these men. I go further: I affirm that you see the very 
souls of these men in seeing this book ; and you feel your- 
selves obliged to allow that they had skill, contrivance, 
design, memory, fancy, reason, and so on. In the same 
manner, if you see a picture, you judge there was a paint- 
er; if you see a house, you judge there was a builder of 
it; and if you see one room contrived for this purpose, 
and another for that ; a door to enter, a window to admit 
light, a chimney to hold fire, you conclude that the builder 
was a person of skill and forecast, who formed the house 
with a view to the accommodation of its inhabitants. In 
this manner examine the world, and pity the man who, 
when he sees the sign of the wheat-sheaf, has sense enough 
to know that there is somewhere a joiner, and somewhere 
«, painter ; but who, when he sees the wheat-sheaf itself, 
is so stupid as not to say to himself, — This creature had 
a wise and good Creator. 

It is impossible for me, in this place, to pursue this part 
©f our subject fully, and therefore I shall conclude it with 
two words of advice, and I give you these on this princi- 
ple, that a little thought of your own, on any subject, is of 
more worth to you than all the thoughts of other men 
sounding in your ears, or clattering through your lips. I 
have that confidence in your memories, that I do think I 
could soon teach you to utter these words — causes — ef- 
fects — combinations — proportions — circulations — equipoise 
— uniformity — variety — series of events — gravitation — and 
so on : and I would do so, if you would give me leave, did 
I not know that, after all my teaching, and your repeat- 
ing what I taught you, you would know just as much of 
the subject as a musical instrument doeg of the tune play- 



ALMISHTy GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OP ALL MANKIND. 23 

cd upon it. Would you not rather be the herdman's poor 
boy, than the finest instrument of music ? Think for 
yourselves, if you think ever so little. 

My first word of advice is, Read the account of the six 
days-works of creation, contained in the first chapter of 
Genesis, and read it over and over again ; let your chil- 
dren get it by heart, so that they may all understand what 
Moses intended to teach ; that is, that God made the heav- 
ens and the earth, and all that is therein. 

My second word of advice is, — Attend diligently to the 
properties, qualities, characters, laws (what shall I call 
them) of creation. Observe one word of Moses ; he says, 
" the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the 
host of them." Observe the word host ; it signifies army : 
and Moses resembled the coUectica of creatures, which 
we call the world^ to such a collection of men as we call 
an army^ for the sake of putting people upon thinking of 
several articles not mentioned in the history. For exam- 
ple : when you see an army, you think of a commanding 
officer, whose order the army obeys, and which, properly 
speaking, is his power, the general's power to protect or 
to destroy. An army makes us think of wisdom that dis- 
posed the men in order, and put them in various ranks, and 
disciplined them with one design, to perform various ex- 
ercises, to produce one great end. Hence you will trace 
the laws, orders, and rules of moving and acting, which 
prevail through the whole creation, up to " the king*, 
whose name is the Lord of Hosts ; who measured the wa- 
ters in the hollow of his hand, who meted out heaven with 
a span, who weighed the mountains in scales, and the hills 
in a balance ; who hangeth the earth upon nothing ; who 
bindeth up waters in thick clouds, and the cloud is not 
rent under them; who made a weight for the winds, a 
decree for the rain, a way for the lightning and the thun- 
der ; who gave goodly wings unto the peac^cV, and 
sent out the wild ass free ; who deprived the ostrich of 
the wisdom of preserving her eggs and her young ; who 
taught the hawk to fly toward the south, and the eagle 
to make her nest upon the crag of the rock; who feeds 
man as a shepherd feeds his flock, and carries him in his 
boRom ;" who doth all this without direction or control ; 



24 ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 

and who, though " all nations before him are as nothing, 
less than nothing, and vanity ;" and though all the whole 
world is not sufficient for one offering to him, yet conde- 
scends, kind Father that he is, to instruct man, and to " say 
unto him. Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom, 
and to depart from evil is understanding." 

The second book for us to read is that of Providence. 
The doctrine of providence, like that of creation, is abun- 
dantly taught in the Holy Scriptures ; and our Saviour re- 
presents God in Providence, under what I will venture to 
call his favourite notion of God, the idea of a Father. 
" One sparrow shall not fall on the ground, without your 
Father : your Father knoweth that ye have need of meat, 
and drink, and clothing." Let it not seem strange to you, 
that God is considered as the friend of a sparrow ; for it is 
no more beneath the majesty of God to provide for a mean 
animal, than it is for him to create it. 

If you would attend to this subject properly, you must 
distinguish two sorts of providence ; the one I call natur- 
al, the other moral : but I will explain myself By natur- 
al providence^ I mean that wise care which God hath ta- 
ken so to dispose all his works, as to make them produce 
the end for which they were created, which respects all 
things that do not come under the description of good and 
bad, righteous and wicked. There is a dependence of one 
thing upon another, like links in a chain, among all the 
creatures in the world. These words of Hosea will ex- 
plain my meaning : " The Lord saith, I will hear the heav- 
ens, and they shall hear the earth, and the earth shall hear 
the corn, and the wine, and the oil ; and they shall hear 
Jezreel." Jezreei is either the son of the prophet, or the 
inhabitants of a place called Jezreei. The health and 
strength, the rest and the lives of these people depended 
on corn, and wine, and oil. Corn and wine and oil de- 
pended on the earth ; the ea-^th depended on the heavens, 
that is, the dew, the air, the sun ; and all these depended 
upon God ; and on this account the Lord calls all the pro- 
ductions of the earth his own. " She did not know that I 
gave her corn, and wine, and oil, and multiplied her silver 
and gold" — she said, '' my lovers give me my bread and 
my water, my wool and my flax" — ^but I the Lord will 



ALMIGHTY 60D THE LOVELY FATHER 0F ALL MANKIND. 25 

*' return, and take away my corn and my wine, and will re- 
cover my wool and my flax ;" and by so doing, I will in- 
struct these ignorant and forgetful children, that I ^' cause 
the bud of the tender herb to spring" forth ; that I am the 
" Father of the rain," the Author of " the drops of the 
dew," the Creator of ice, the Parent of the "hoary frost 
©f heaven," and of all the powers and productions of the 
world. This is the wisdom which Solomon sent the slug- 
gard to an ant-hill to learn ; and it is on supposition that 
we observe these things, that the Scriptures direct us to 
consider how lilies grow, how ravens live, and what atten- 
tion oxen and asses pay to their owners. This should 
teach us to be humane and kind to animals, because ani- 
mals have no depravity, the peacock no pride, the 
horse no malice, the bee no anger ; the fowls that take 
your seed do not steal it ; the cattle that break your 
fences have no guilt for doing so ; for they have a char- 
ter, which says, '' I, God, have given every herb, and 
every tree to you for meat ; and to every beast of the 
earth, and to every fowl of the air, and to every thing 
that creepeth upon the earth wherein there is life, I have 
given every green herb for meat :" but '' let man have 
dominion over them" all. You, little boys, while I think 
of it, let me give you a lesson. Do not make yourselves 
sport with what gives other creatures pain. Do not tor- 
ment and kill frogs, birds, and flies. You would not, I am 
sure, hack, and chop, and torture my horse, or my cow, or 
my milch-ass, or my chickens, because they are mine ; 
and though you may not love them, yet you would not 
hurt them for love of me. Remember, my good boys, all 
live creatures belong to Almighty God, and he will be dis- 
pleased with you if you hurt them. When you become 
men, you will know that some animals, like some men, 
must be put to death for the safety of the rest ; but none 
are put to death, except such as do mischief to others ; 
and the way for you to come to that end is to learn, by 
tormenting and killing animals, how in time to pluck up 
your hearts, and murder men. 

By moral Providence^ I mean that connexion which Go(5 
hath established between virtue and happiness, vice and 
misery ; and oy which he discovers himself the just pro- 



lector of goodness, and the punisher of wickedness. Gliitr- 
lony, drunkenness, and debauchery, are attended with dis- 
eases, and often death itself. Envy, malice, and revenge, 
are productive of uneasiness, guilt, and shame. Con- 
science makes man happy when he does right, and miser- 
able when he does wrong ; and it is here, in the heart, 
that you are to look for this kind of government of God, 
and not in the outward circumstances of your neighbours. 
In some cases, it is not in the power of outward calamities 
to make a man unhappy ! in other cases, the stings of con- 
science are so piercing and keen, that it is not in the pow- 
er of all the wealth and splendor in the world to make a 
man happy. Do not judge of this moral order by the 
stroke of a thunderbolt, the falling of the tower in Siloam, 
the cruelty of Pilate to the Galileans : but look at the king 
of an hundred and twenty-seven provinces, who could not 
command one night's rest. Look at the king walking in 
his palace, and saying, " is not this great Babylon, that 1 
have built for the honour of my majesty ?" See his pride 
distracts him ; he is " driven from men, and eats grass like 
an ox." Observe the restlessness of cruel Pharaoh, the 
convulsions of carousing Belshazzar, the distress of treach- 
erous Saul, and the despair of covetous Judah. So true is 
that saying, whether we see it or not ; '' The wicked man 
travelleth with pain all his days ; a dreadful sound is in 
his ears ; trouble and anguish prevail against him, as a 
king ready to the battle ; and he knoweth that the day of 
darkness is ready at his hand." All these discover God 
as the Father and Friend of piety, justice, and benevo- 
lence ; and so a '^ Father of the fatherless," and the hus- 
band of the desolate widow. So the " poor hath hopej 
and iniquity stoppeth her mouth." 

The third book is literally that of Scripture. My breth- 
ren, know the worth of this book ; it may serve to you for 
a life of uncommon length, a genius of uncommon pene- 
tration, and an experience of uncommon exertion. The 
Bible, as a history, makes you acquainted with the sub- 
stance of all that passed in the world worth remembering, 
for the space of four thousand years, and upwards. By ac- 
quainting yourselves with this history, you will seem to be 
alive with Adam, to outlive the flood, to travel with Abra- 



ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 27 

ham, Isaac, and Jacob ; to go down into Egypt, to come 
out through the wilderness and Red Sea with Moses, to 
sit with the Judges, to reign with Solomon, to weep in 
captivity with Ezekiel, to return to Judea with Nehemi- 
ah, to see John the Baptist, to hear Jesus Christ, and to 
go with his apostles over various countries. By acquaint- 
ing yourselves with this book, you will understand a thou- 
sand subjects, which otherwise you could never know. 
You will sit in the councils of princes, dive into the de- 
signs of armies, see through the temples of idols, behold the 
Tarious modes of worshipping the true God ; yea, you will 
be admitted into the councils of God, and " know the 
thoughts of peace he thinks towards you." 

By acquainting yourselves with this, you will have 
all the benefit, without the pain of experiment. All the 
trials of Solomon to make himself happy in creatures ; all 
the trial of Jonah to protect himself in disobedience to 
God ; all the exercises of Job under affliction, and of Da- 
rid in raptures of devotion ; all the pain of Peter when 
he fell ; and all the pleasure of Paul under persecution ; 
all these will be yours : advantages which a long life, a 
fine genius, and a thousand trials could not have procured 
you. If you attend properly to this book, I am confident 
you will say, " these things were our examples, to the in- 
tent we should not lust after evil things, as they lusted." 
One will say, " I will not be an idolater, as were some of 
them ; as it is written, — The people sat down to eat and 
drink, and rose up to play :" another will say, I will " not 
commit fornication, as some of them committed, and fell 
in one day three and twenty thousand :" a third will say, 
I will " not tempt Christ, as some of them tempted, and 
were destroyed of serpents :" a fourth will say, I will " not 
murmur, as some of them also murmured and were de- 
stroyed of the destroyer." Inevery period of this history, 
God seems to say of each of us, " wilt thou not, from this 
time, cry unto me. My Father, thou art the guide of my 
youth ? Thou shalt call me. My Father, and shalt not turn 
away from me. 

The last book, in which you may read the favour and 
friendship of God, is Jesus Christy whose person indeed is 
in heaven ; but who, by his history, contained in the four 



28 ALMIGHTJT GOD THE LOVELY FATPIER OF ALL MAN^KlND. 

Gospels, may be said, in some sense, to be living, and 
walking, and preaching among us. I am sorry to say, the 
eoming of such a person, on such an errand, into this 
world, supposes that we were ignorant, wicked, and idle 
children. Such children might well be afraid to go home 
at night to a father, whom they could not but know they 
had grievously offended. Our heavenly Father knew this, 
and " so loved the world, that he sent his only begotten 
Son, the brightness of his glory," to cairn our fears ; his 
own exact likeness, as far as man could represent God, to 
publish his eternal love to his abandoned family, and to 
declare, that whosoever believed in Jesus Christ, how poor, 
how wicked, how wretched soever he had been, need not 
be afraid of the gloom of death, and the midnight of eter- 
nity, but " should have everlasting life." Such good news^ 
»o undeserved, and so far beyond the manner of man, de- 
manded proof of an extraordinary kind ; and this proof Je- 
sus Christ gave by fulfilling prophecy, and working mirar 
cles ; which he wrought not for the sake of ostentatioa, 
but to fix beyond a doubt, in this forlorn world, full an^ 
everlasting proof of the truth of his doctrine. Draw near 
to this express image of God, ye ignorant and disobedienjt 
children ! See, in his eyes, how the God of thunder, and 
lightning, and terror, will look at you. Behold, you are 
the prodigal son, and he is the Father, who sees you, and 
•' has compassion, and runs and falls on your neck, and 
kisses you, and says. Bring forth the best robe, and put it 
on him, and put a ring on his hand, and shoes on his feet j 
and bring hither the fatted calf, and kill it, and let us eat 
and be merry ; for this my son was dead, and is alive 
again ; he was lost, and is found." Do not say, this is an 
old history of what was done eighteen hundred years ago : 
no such thing, it is a history of all ages, and hath been do- 
ing every day, from the time in which " the voice of the 
Lord God walked in the garden of Eden in the cool of tlie 
day, and said unto Adam, where art thou ? Hast thou eat- 
en of the tree whereof I commanded thee that thou 
shouldest not eat ?" Did the serpent beguile thee ? 
^'- Cursed be the serpent above all cattle : but the seed of 
the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." Every pen- 
itent, convicted in his own conscience, and returning to 



ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 29 

God, through Jesus Christ, meets with a like treatment, 
and " receiveth the spirit of adoption, wherehy he cries, 
Abba, Father. Wherefore he is no more a servant, but a 
son ; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ." 

If you would learn more of this subject, inquire of" the 
woman taken in adultery," condemned to be stoned by Moses 
in the law, exposed by her fellow sinners, and referred to 
Jesus Christ. Ask her how he looked, and in what tone 
he spoke, when he said, " Woman, where are thine ac- 
cusers ? Hath no man condemned thee ? Neither do I 
condemn thee ; go, and sin no more." Ask that other wo- 
man, " who was a sinner," who durst not look him in the 
face, but " stood at his feet, behind him, weeping;" ask 
her to describe the melody of that voice that said, " There 
was a certain creditor which had two debtors, the one owed 
five hundred pence, and the other fifty, and when they 
had nothing to pay, he frankly forgave them both." I ven- 
ture to affirm, that the great apostle Peter never had abil- 
ty enough fully to express the wisdom, the tender compas- 
sion, and the irresistible power of that one act, contained 
ia one line of an evangelest, " the Lord turned, and look- 
ed upon Peter :" and that Paul never was able fully to 
express the tone of that voice, which said unto him, '' Saul, 
Saul, why persecutest thou me ?" For '' the love of Christ 
passeth knowledge," and is " able to do exceeding abund- 
antly, above all that we ask or think." To use the lan- 
guage of the last mentioned apostle, " Jesus Christ shew- 
ed forth exceeding abundant grace, and love, and longsuf- 
fering" in these cases, " for a pattern to them which 
should hereafter believe on him to life everlastino-." 

In these four v/ays our heavenly Father makes known 
his esteem for us; and wilfully blind is that worthless 
child who doth not perceive it. I quit the subject with 
reluctance ; but as it is nearly time to conclude, I will 
close with one remark, which, I earnestly pray God, may 
improve our hearts, and amend our lives. 

There are four sorts of people, each differently affected 
towards " our Father, who is in heaven." The first are 
without him . . . the second are against him . . . the third 
dreadhim . . . and the last, of which sort may you all be.-^ 
the last love and adore him. 
4* 



30 ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND, 

Some men are " without God in the world ;" and to such 
a degree of inattention hath a habit of sin brought them, 
that they are blind amidst all the light of proofs that there 
is a God, and dead to all the feelings that his fatherly 
goodness ought to excite in their hearts. Do not deceive 
yourselves : it is impossible to know God, and not love 
and obey him ; and you yourselves prove this. Did you 
ever spend one half hour in your life to inquire into this 
question, ^' Where is God, my maker, who teacheth me 
more than the beasts of the earth, and maketh me wiser 
than the fowls of heaven ?" On the contrary, do not all 
your actions " say unto God, Depart from me, for I desire 
not the knowledge of thy ways ? What is the Almighty, 
that I should serve him ? What can the Almighty do for 
me ? and what profit should I have if I pray unto him ?" 
Do you not " go in company with workers of iniquity," 
like yourself, and " walk with wicked men," who say, " It 
profiteth a man nothing that he should delight himself with 
God ?" Poor child ! The Scripture pronounceth thee a 
fool. Well, go on ; follow that great ideot Pharaoh, and 
continue to say, '' Who is the Lord, that I should obey his 
voice ? I know not the Lord, neither will I obey his 
voice :" but settle as you go toward the gulf, where, like 
Pharaoh, you will '' sink into the bottom as a stone ;" I 
say, think of this dreadful question, and come to some con- 
clusion about it : — " Who ever hardened himself against 
God, and prospered?" 

Stupid as this first class of men is, the second is more 
so ; those men I mean, who set themselves against God. 
These are said, in Scripture, to hate God, and to resist 
him. What a character, what a monstrous character, my 
brethren, is this, haters of God ! I know no men who so 
justly deserve this character, as they who hate and perse- 
cute good men for being religious ; yet, in general, all 
who oppose the great design of God, our heavenly Fa- 
ther, in creating the Avorld and redeeming the church, 
may very properly be said to be at enmity with God. God 
intend* to make his children happy, by giving them life, 
liberty, property, reason, religion, and so on. A murder- 
er, by taking away the life of another, expresses his ha- 
tred of God's design of making the other happy by life. A 



ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY JFATHER OF ALL MANKM>. 31 

tyrant, who deprives a person of liberty, resists the design 
of God in making his children happy, by making them 
free. A miser who hoards wealth, and a thief who steals 
it, both resist the design of God, which was to make men 
happy by giving them property. A persecutor, who will 
not allow people to be governed in the choice of a reli- 
gion by their own convictions, but requires all to act ac- 
cording to his wisdom, or perhaps his folly and worldly 
interest, he also withstands the design of God, which was 
to make all his children happy, each by the exercise of 
his own reason. A bigot, who will suffer no sense of 
Scripture but his own, and that perhaps doubtful or false, 
and taxes the Gospel itself with being of his spirit, he al- 
so is a reviler of the Gospel, an enemy to the religion of 
his neighbours, and an antagonist, contending against God. 
Let us lay aside all these wicked dispositions, and remem- 
ber that great lesson given from heaven to a man of this 
sort, " It is hard to kick against the pricks ;" which either 
means, that it is impossible to succeed in attempting to op- 
pose God ; or that all such attempts come from the hard- 
ness or insensibility of our own hearts. Had we such feel- 
ings for mankind, as children of the same parent ought to 
have for one another ; or had we such emotions towards 
God as children ought to have for such a Father, we should 
not make these rash attempts. 

Our third class are objects of pity ; they are not with- 
out God ; they do not set themselves against him ; but 
they dread him; that is, their fear of God is excessive. 
The cause of this dread is a partial knowledge of God. 
Recollect what I said to you sometime ago, concerning 
knowing only part of a subject. This is your case : you 
have attended to the judgments of God ; to his threaten- 
ings against the wicked, and to that punishment which 
awaits them in another state ; but you have not turned 
your attention to the mercy of God, expressed in his prom- 
ises, and in his dispensations of goodness to other sinners 
in your condition. Suppose I could take a person out of 
this assembly, one who had never seen the sea, and carry 
him in an instant to the seaside, and set him down there ; 
and suppose the sea at that instant to be in a storm ; the 
great, black, and dismal clouds rolling, thunders bellow- 



32 ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 

ing, lightnings flashing, the winds roaring, the sea dashing 
ten thousand watery mountains one against another, the 
beach covered with shattered timber and cordage, mer- 
chandise~and gorpses ; this man would instantly conceive 
a dreadful idea of the sea, and would shudder, and shriek, 
and flee for his life. It would be hard to give this man 
a pleasant notion of the sea, especially if he had been well 
informed that several of his relations and friends had per- 
ished in the tempest ; yet this man would have but half a 
right notion of the sea ; for could he be prevailed on to 
go down to the beach a few days after, the heavens would 
smile, the air be serene, the water smooth, the seamen 
whistling and singing, here a vessel of trade sailing before 
the wind, there a fleet of men of war coming into har- 
bour, yonder pleasure-boats basking in the sun, the flute 
making melody of the breeze, the company, even the soft- 
er sex, enjoying themselves without fear ; this man would 
form the other half-notion of the sea ; and the two put to- 
gether would be the just and true idea of it. Apply this 
to our subject. You have seen your heavenly Father re- 
prove Adam, chide Moses, drown the old world, barn the 
cities of the plain, cause the earth to open and swallow up 
Dathm and his company, send a Joseph to prison, put a 
Jeremiah into a dungeon, and a Daniel into a den of lions; 
you have seen him fell a Paul down to the earth ; not on- 
ly kill an Ananias and Sapphira upon the spot, but strike a 
Zechariah dumb, and cleave the heart of even a Peter 
asunder with recollection and repentance ; but go back to 
these persons, and see a Paul " preaching the faith which 
he once destroyed ;" a Peter " begotten again unto a live- 
ly hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead ;" 
a Zechariah filled with the Holy Ghost, and singing, 
'' Blessed be the Lord God of Israel, through whose ten- 
der mercy the dayspring from on high hath visited us, 
and hath delivered us out of the hands of our enemies, 
that we might serve him without fear, in holiness, all the 
days of our life." I might go further, and affirm, that your 
confidence in God ought to be as much greater than your 
dread, as his mercies are greater than his punishments. 
True, five wicked cities are burned ; but how many fives 
are preserved ! one Zechariah is struck dumb for unlx^- 



ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOTELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND. 33 

lief; but how many unbelievers have the gift of speech ! 
And you, yourself, how many comforts to set against one 
twig of ,his rod ! Do not add ingratitude to fear ; but lis- 
ten to these words, sweeter than honey and the honey- 
comb ; " Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that 
obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in dark- 
ness, and hath no light ? let him trust in the name of the 
Lord, and stay upon his God." 

The last class love God and adore him. They have 
studied his excellent nature, and are fully persuaded, there 
is nothing in him to inspire his children with horror, but 
every thing to animate them with esteem. They have 
examined his works, and they exclaim concerning the 
whole world, " Behold, it is very good." The good man 
every day considers his dispensations of Providence ; how 
*' he leads men forth by the right way, to a city of habita- 
tion ;" how " he filleth the hungry soul with goodness ;" 
how he " sends his word, and heals" the sick ; how he 
makes the storm a calm, and brings men who have been 
at their wits end unto their desired haven; how he 
makes the fields and vineyards yield fruits of increase ; 
how he poureth contempt upon princes, and yet setteth 
the poor on high from affliction. The good man is " wise, 
and observes these things, and so understands the loving 
-kindness of the Lord ;" he searches the holy Scriptures, 
and beholds in all a God of inexpressible goodness and 
love, " pitying them that fear him, like as a father pitieth 
his children. Mercy great, above the heavens ; truth, 
reaching unto the clouds ; compassion, from everlasting to 
everlasting ; goodness, kept for thousands ;^' an eminence 
of perfections " exalted above all blessing and praise." 
The good man is captivated with the character of God, as 
it is displayed in Jesus Christ : him he accounts fairer 
than the children of men. Grace, he thinks, is poured in- 
to his lips ; and to him he saith, '^ Thy throne, O God, is 
forever and ever : the sceptre of thy kingdom is a right 
sceptre. Thou lovest righteousness, and hatest wicked- 
ness" more than all mankind ; " therefore God, thy God, 
hath anointed thee with the oil of gladness above thy fel- 
lows." Full of these ideas, and full of blessings and good 
wishes toward all mankind, the good man waits for his dis- 



34 ALMIGHTY GOD THE LOVELY FATHER OF ALL MANKIND, 

solution ; hoping he shall go down by soft and easy steps, 
fast hold of that friend who was born to serve him in ad- 
versity, into the grave, and thence rise into the temple of 
that God, in whose presence is fulness of joy, and at whose 
^' right band there are pleasures for evermore." 



DISCOUESE III. 

WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 

lAT HAUXTOM.-] 
PSALM xvi. 6. 

The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; yea^ I have 
a goodly heritage. 

'' True," says one of my hearers, *' you had a g'oodly heri- 
tage, David ; and I would say of my lot, as you did of yours, 
had I a Jesse for my father, a Solomon for my son, a pal- 
ace for my habitation, gold and silver in abundance, abili- 
ty to write scripture, and hope in a joyful resurrection :" 
but, recollect, if David had a Jesse for his own father, he 
had a Saul for his father-in-iaw ; if he had one son a Sol- 
omon, he had others who were disobedient, rebellious, and 
wicked ; if he had a palace, he could not sometimes get an 
hour's rest in it ; he was " weary with groaning, made his 
bed every night to swim, and watered his couch with his 
tears ;" if he had riches, and abilities, and religion, he had 
also a lady for his wife who ridiculed religion, and des- 
pised him for employing bis wealth and abilities in the 
service of it. In a word, happiness is distributed among 
mankind much more equally than most men imagine. My 
design, this evening, is to convince you of this, to persuade 
you to apply the language of the text to your own lot, 
and so to engage you to offer to- Almighty God that noble 
evening sacrifice of content, gratitude, and praise. 

Do not suppose, I am insensible of your afflictions. How 
is it possible, that a man, like yourselves, subject to the 
same sickness and pain, and calamities, and death, should 
be blind to such events ? Even self-love obliges us to feel 
for others what we fear ourselves. I say more, I affirm 
that God himself " sees the affliction of his people, hears 



36 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 

their cry, knows their sorrows, considers all the oppress- 
ions that are done under the sun, beholds the tears of the 
oppressed who have no comforter," and with a sympathy, 
beyond all conception, delicate and tender, reaches out in 
religion his own soft hand to " wipe away tears from all 
faces." 

This sixteenth psalm is quoted by the apostle Peter, in 
his first sermon after the pouring* out of the Holy Ghost, 
and applied to Jesus Christ : but the reason given by the 
apostle, why the latter part of the psalm was not fulfilled 
in David, furnisheth us with a reason why the former part 
of the psalm was fully accomplished in him. The latter 
part of the psalm spea'ts of rising from the dead before 
the body of the deceased person began to decay. This 
was not true of David ; but it was true of one of his fami- 
ly, Jesus Christ, and of him David spoke in the character 
of a prophet : but the former part of the psalm speaks of 
living contented, and holy, and happy under the protection 
of God in this world; and all this David experienced in 
his own person. He was willing to profit us, by telling 
his own experience, and therefore " said unto the Lord, 
My goodness extendeth not to thee, but to the saints that 
are in the earth, and to the excellent in whom is all my 
delight." With this view he describes, in the fourth 
verse, the misery of such as live in idolatrous countries ; 
*' their sorrows shall be multiplied, that hasten after anoth- 
er God ;" and the happy situation of himself and others, 
who had an inheritance in a land where the true God was 
known and worshipped. He calls his family estate a lot^ 
l)ecause, when Joshua divided the land of Canaan among 
the tribes of Israel, to prevent all disputes, and in obedi- 
ence to the express command of God by Moses, they drew 
lots for their parcels of land; and as some famiiies, in all 
the tribes, were fewer than other families, these lots were 
subdivided, and measiired out by a line. " Miinj had the 
more inheritance, and few the less inheritance, to every fam- 
ily according to the number of names." Thus God " cast 
out the heathen, and divided his people an inheritance by 
line, and made the tribes of Israel to dwell in their tents." 
The lot of the tribe of Judah is exactly described in thf 
fifteenth chapter of Joshua; and the book of Ruth is a 



WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 37 

pleasant liistoiT of the manner in which Boaz, the great 
grandfather of David, lived on the famil}^ estate. 

My brethren, of such importance to the present and 
everlasting happiness of man is the knowledge of the 
true God, that we ought to prefer the condition of a 
beggar in the streets of a christian country, or that of a 
patient in a hospital, yea more, that of an unfortunate 
debtor in a county jail, in such a country, before that of 
the most rich and prosperous emperor in heathen igno- 
rance and wickedness. Heathen countries are "dark 
places of the earth, full of habitations of cruelty," and 
" the curse of the Lord is in every house of the wicked !" 
" O !" said the holy Psalmist, " deliver not the soul of 
thy turtle-dove unto the multitude of the wicked !" If, 
therefore, I were only able to convince you, that in this 
valley of trouble there was a door of hope, that your 
dreary path led to your Father's house in heaven, I 
should have a right to require you to say, " The lines 
are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; yea, I have a 
goodly heritage :" but though I am going to endeavour 
to convince you of this, yet I shall not content myself 
with this, but shall prove that j^ou have so many accom- 
modations on the road, that nothing but ignorance and 
ingratitude can make you discontented. 

I will not conceal from you the principle on which 
I go in this discourse. I deny myself the pleasure of 
examining the general laws of Providence, by which 
the whole world is governed, from the smallest particle 
of dust to the noblest creature in it. It would be de- 
lightful, delightful beyond expression, to trace the wis- 
dom and goodness, the power and the justice of God, 
through every part of his dominion : but it is with the 
mind as it is with the hand; if we would grasp too much, 
we lose all. Instead, then, of attempting to refresh you 
with the smell of ail the flowers in the world put to- 
gether, I pluck one, and bring you to night the Provi- 
dence of God as it reg-ards yourselves, the inhabitants 
of this little village, this very little spot of the bound- 
less territory of God. Let us go to the subject. 

Consider first the age of the world in which you live, 
t-arry back your attention to the «tate of tlie world 
4 



38 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE- 

nearly six thousand years ago, and consider what a dreary 
desert the earth was before any of the works of art 
had been employed to render it an agreeable habitation. 
There was the same sun, the same rains, the same 
winds, the same tempests, the same long cold winters, 
in which Providence " gave snow like wool, scattered 
hoar frost like ashes, cast forth ice like morsels," and 
made men cry, " Who can stand before the cold ?" I 
say, there were the same inclemencies of seasons as 
now: but where were the carpenters, bricklayers, 
thatchers, colliers, clothiers, and ail that multitude of 
benefactors, who contribute to t:he pleasure and safety 
of life ? Even within the memory of some present, in- 
struments of husbandry, and common conveniencies of 
life, have been rendered far more handy and commodi- 
ous than they were formerly. In those ages, one part 
of the world produced one kind of fruits, and animals, 
and foods, and another part of the world produced diifer- 
ent sorts ; and hence, in those times, little variety, great 
scarcity, and frequent famine, in which men, like vul- 
tures, tore one another in pieces for the necessaries of 
life. We need not go so far back ; we will just glance 
at our own country a few hundred years ago. There 
were no printed books, no paper, no spectacles, no glass, 
no clocks, no candles, no fireplaces, no linen, no silver 
or gold for common uses; the women rode astride 
through the streets of the best cities, in the mud ; and 
wine was sold only b}'^ apothecaries, as a cordial, and 
hence came the word dram^ which signified the eighth 
part of an ounce, the quantity then taken by our ances- 
tors at a time. It would be endless, and almost incredi- 
ble, to relate the abject condition of all nations, in the 
first periods of their history. They always appear one 
degree above a herd of cattle, and no more. 

Let no one think we are trifling, and got out of the 
bounds of scriptural instruction. It is lamented in sa- 
cred history, that at a certain time there was '' no smith 
found throughout all the land of Israel ; but all the Is- 
raelites went dov/n to the Philistines, to sharpen every 
man his share and his coulter, and his axe and his mat- 
tock ; so that in the day of battle there was neither 



W-E OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 39 

sword nor spear found in the hand of any of the people 
that were with Sanl and Jonathan." It was very proper, 
therefore, for an inspired writer to make honourable 
mention of one, who taught men to dwell in tents, and 
of another, who instructed artificers how to work in 
brass and iron. How think you, my brethren, when 
God shall judge the world, and the two men shall stand 
before him, one the Tubal Cain, who taught men to work 
iron, and the other, king Jeroboam, w^ho taught Israel 
to sin ; which of these two men will appear most re- 
spectable in the eyes of the Judge, and of all mankind ? 
For my part, I look upon the smith in a parish, as a 
disciple of Tubal Cain, and I respect him, because he 
contributes^ to your ease in the field ; to your pleasure, 
when you travel ; to your safety by locks and bolts at 
home ; and to your defence in case of danger ; and what 
I say of him, I affirm of every one, who hath contribut- 
ed in former times, or who doth contribute now, to ren- 
der life easy and agreeable : and when I observe, that 
others have been labouring for almost six thousand years, 
in their several occupations, for us, and that we are en- 
tered into their labours, that one soweth and another 
reapeth, and that we reap that whereon we bestowed 
no labour ; I cannot help exclaiming with the text, 
" The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; yea, 
I have a goodly heritage !" Our condition resembles 
that of the Israelites, and God hath placed us in a land, 
" to give us great and goodly cities, which we builded 
not ; houses full of all good things, which we filled not ; 
wells, which we digged not ; and gardens, and orchards, 
and trees, which we planted not." Observe, my breth- 
ren, what the rnan of God added to all this, — " Then 
beware lest thou forget the Lord ;" beware, lest you 
be ignorant of your first benefactor, the instructer of all 
artists among mankind, and ungrateful to him, who 
" created the smith that bloweth the coals in the fire, 
and that bringeth forth an instrument for his work ;" 
who '' instructed the plowman to open and break the 
clods of his ground," to harrow and roll, and make 
smooth the face thereof, to cast wheat in the principal 
place, or in the strongest soil, and rye and barley in 



40 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 

soils appointed for them ; who gave man discretion to 
beat out vetches with a staff, and to thresh cummin 
with a rod, to bruise bread-corn, and so to prepare 
nourishment for himself, and his family, and his neigh- 
bours. All these '' come from the Lord of Hosts, who 
is wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working ;'' and 
all these demand of us a tribute of gratitude and praise. 
Every time, therefore, that you take a receipt, or write 
a date, or hear the sound of One thousand seven hun- 
dred and sixty, or eighty, remember the text, and think, 
•' The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant times, j^ea, I 
have a goodly heritage." 

Consider next the country which you inhabit. Could 
you rise so high as to see all the kingdoms oi the earth 
roll under your eye ; could you survey them all as ea- 
sily as you can a terrier of jom: lands, you would 
feel a disposition to prefer this in which you dwell, and 
of your being born in which you may truly say, " Not 
unto us, O Lord, not unto us ; but unto thy name we 
give glory." I say nothing of those burning countries, 
where the heaven over head is brass, and the earth 
under the feet iron ; where the sun rises more like a 
strong man to destroy, than like a " bridegroom coming 
out of his chamber" to make men rejoice : nothing of 
those frozen countries, where God " sealeth up the hand 
of every man," and where he " reserves treasures of 
snow and hail against the day of battle :" nothing of 
those dreadful countries, where w^hirlwinds and earth- 
quakes, and thunder, and lightning, and hurricanes, de- 
stroy ail the hope of man ; where the God of glory 
thundereth so as to break the cedars, to shake the wil- 
derness, to make huge mountains skip like calves, to 
force the hinds to calve, and (o strip whole districts bare 
of every green thing : nothing of those countries, where 
fevers, inflammations, extreme burning, and diseases 
peculiar to the situation, kill the wretched inhabitants : 
so we read of" the botch of Egypt." I say nothing of these ; 
for which of these do we desire ? Nor Vviil I detain 
you to observe the natural advantages of our country, 
which is the first in the world : an island guarded hj 
the ocean, and open to all its treasures, with docks and 



WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 41 

harbours to our utmost wishes : a land productive of 
corn, herbs, grass, timber, and fruits : a country water- 
ed with the dews and the rains of heaven, feeding in- 
numerable springs and wells, and navigable rivers : a 
land, out of whose hills you may dig brass, iron, stone, 
marble, coals, claj, marles, and innumerable articles of 
daily use : a land that maintains cattle, fowls, flocks, 
dairies, hives, and a thousand other classes, labouring 
for the inhabitants. I will not enlarge on these advan- 
tages, nor will I at present speak of the improved state 
of husbandry, building, trade, learning, and the other , 
ornaments of our countrj^ 

Let me, however, be allowed to observe what more 
immediately concerns you all ; that is, the civil liberty 
we enjoy. The life of the meanest of you all is so 
guarded by the law, that in the heat of the day, after 
you have mowed half an acre of grass, you may lie 
do.wn and refresh yourself by sleep at the end of the 
Svvathes ; and should any daring hand take away your 
life, your blood Avould be required of the murderer by 
the hand of the magistrate. What God formerly said 
of the patriarchs, the law of England saith of every one 
of you ; yea more, of every limb of every one of you : 
" Touch not mine anointed, and do my prophets no harm." 
Your property, little or much, is equally guarded by 
law. No master can " keep back the hire of the la- 
bourers, who have reaped down his fields ;" nor can 
any man deprive you of what you have, without your 
consent. You may lay it up, or lay it out ; you may 
give it to others, or spend it on yourself; you are the 
absolute lord of your little all. I love to see the plow- 
man leave his coat at the land's end, and the gleaner 
trust her gleans, her bread, and her bottle, on a balk ; 
and I always conceive of the law, as a wall of fire round 
about them. The law saith, in effect, he that toucheth 
you ; he that toucheth your garden-stuff, your fruit, your 
cattle, your poultry, your linen on the hedge, any thing 
that is yours, '• toucheth the apple of mine eye," Your 
freedom, too, is fully established, except in one single 
case, which regards the settlements of the poor ; and 
that case hath been taken up by a humane gentleman 
4* 



42 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDEJ^CE.-. 

in this country, and I hope in due time will be attended 
to. Except that, your freedom is fully established. You 
may live where you please, go and come when you 
please, and do what you please, provided you injure no 
other person. You need never want a day's work if 
you be well, nor the necessaries of life if you be sick. 
In other countries the life of a subject is at the will of 
his lord : property in some countries they have none, 
the poor are property themselves, the slaves and beasts 
of the gentry, who buy and sell them with their estates. 
There are subjects on which no conversation may be 
allowed, and there is nothing but one general slaver}^ ; 
like Egypt, the whole country is resembled to a large 
jail, a house of bondage, in which the chains of some are 
of iron, and those of others are of gold ; but all are in 
slavery, and have no deliverer to set them free. Oh 
happy people of this country ! your '■'• garners afford all 
manner of store ; your sheep" (they are your own, re- 
member) " bring forth thousands, and may bring forth 
ten thousands in your streets ; your oxen may be strong- 
er to labour" than those of others : you may be, on ac- 
count of your advantages, an object of envy, but you 
cannot be subject to plunder ; for there is no violent 
" breaking in, no complaining in your streets ! Happy 
is that people that is in such a case ! The lines are 
fallen unto them in pleasant places ; yea, they have a 
goodly heritage." Whenever you hear the sound of 
these words, parish-rates . . . constable . . . justice of 
peace . . . assizes . . . law . . . liberty . . . property . . . 
life . . . recollect the text, and remember your happiness ; 
for " touching the bone and the flesh" often makes a 
man " curse God to his face. Skin for skin, yea, all that 
a man hath, will he give for his life." 

If this article ought to affect other men, it ought 
much more to stir up thankfulness in husbandmen. Al- 
most all the property of a farmer lies abroad : your cat- 
tle are abroad night and day ; the corn of last harvest 
lies abroad in stacks ; the hay and fodder for the winter 
lie abroad; your firing lies abroad; the wheat of next 
year is abroad, and the tender blade is exposed to dan- 
ger ; yet all these in this country lie safely. It is not 



WC OUOHt TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 43 

SO in some other countries now ; it was not so with Job 
formerly. Job was at home sacrificing to God, his ten 
children were feasting" at their eldest brother's house, 
when, lo, a messenger came, and said " the Sabeans fell 
upon the oxen and asses, and took them away ; and 
they have slain the servants with the edge of the 
sword :" another came and said, " the Chaldeans made 
out three bands, and fell upon the camels, and have car- 
ried them away." And thus the greatest of all the men 
of the East was in one day reduced to a state of extreme 
poverty ; and all that his friends could do was to try to 
comfort him under his losses. It is more desirable not 
to be exposed to such sufferings, than to have friends to 
comfort us under them. 

Consider further the religion o{ this country. Though 
we are not ail christians, yet there are many societies 
of true Christians among us ; and we are in a country 
where nothing but our own obstinacy can prevent our 
being Christians ourselves. To be a Christian, it is 
necessary there should be a Christ, a person appointed 
to redeem us from ignorance, guilt, and inaction. There 
is such a person ; we know where he was born, how he 
lived, what he taught, how he was put to death, whith- 
er he is gone, what is to be done in his absence, when 
he will come again, how he will reckon with all man- 
kind, and give up the kingdom to his Father. It is nec- 
essary we should have full proof of the truth of all this ; 
and such is the connexion which the wisdom of God 
hath established between prophecy and promise, that 
every travelling Jew is himself a living witness to es- 
tablish the truth of our holy religion. 

To be a Christian, it is necessary to have the holy 
Scriptures : you have them in you own mother tongue, 
so cheap that any body may buy the book, and so plain 
that the meanest creature may understand it. If any 
one be so extremely poor, that he cannot purchase a 
bible, the charity of other Christians will bestow it for 
nothing : and if any one cannot read it himself, other 
Christians will read it to him. How often have I had 
the honor of doing this for some of you ! We had in 
our congregation a poor, aged widow, who could neither 



44 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH fROVIDENCE. 

read the Scriptures, nor live without hearing them 
read ; so much instruction and pleasure did she derive 
from the oracles of God. She lived in a lone place, 
and the family where she lodged could not read ; but 
there was one more cottage near, and in it a little boy, a 
shepherd's son, who could read ; but he, full of play, 
was not fond of reading the Bible. Necessity is the 
mother of invention. The old widow determined to 
rise one hour sooner in a morning, to spin one half-pen- 
ny more, to be expended in hiring the shepherd's boy 
to read to her every evening a chapter ; to which he 
readily agreed. This little advantage made her con- 
tent in her cottage, and even say, " The lines are fallen 
to me in pleasant places." You, little boys, learn to 
read, and read the Scriptures, to comfort the old peo- 
ple about you. Perhaps you may make lame and blind 
people say, for your sakes, '•' The lines are fallen unto 
us in pleasant places ; yea, we have a goodly heritage." 
To be a Christian, it is necessary to judge of what we 
read, or hear read, and to form sentiments of our owa 
concerning it. You have judgment and full liberty to 
make use of it. You may, if you think it necessary to 
salvation, enter into all the questions debated among 
Christians, and, take what side you will, you risk no- 
thing. You may worship God in what form your con- 
science approves ; and "• who is he that will harm you, 
if ye be followers of that which is good ?" In some 
countries there is, established by law, what is called a 
public faith ; and in such countries people are treated 
as if they were destitute of reason, as they are suppos- 
ed to be, if they doubt the truth of any part of the es- 
tablished faith. They are treated as if they either had 
no conscience, or as much command over it as the steers- 
man hath over a ship, who, '' with a very small helm, 
turneth it about whithersoever he listeth." Oh happy 
people ! (5ould you consult the dead, '' the souls of them 
that were slain for the word of God, and for the testi- 
mony which they held ;" some " who were tortured, 
others who had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, 
yea of bonds and imprisonment;" some who were ston- 
ed ; others, who were sawn asunder ; and others, who 



WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 45 

•' wandered about in sheep skins and goat skins, desti- 
tute in deserts, afflicted among mountains, tormented in 
dens and caves of the earth," and whose cries never yet 
pierced the ears of men, so artfully have their murder- 
ers managed their cruelties ; I say, consult this "great 
multitude, which no man can number, of all nations, and 
kindreds, and people," who came out of such great trib- 
ulation, and they, with one voice, will inform you, that 
while they are ascribing salvation to God in heaven, 
yon ought to be exclaiming on earth, " The lines are 
fallen unto us in pleasant places ; yea, we have a good- 
ly heritage !" 

My brethren, it is glorious to be a martyr ; and the 
public worship of God is worth all the blood that hath 
been shed in the world to support it; but have we all 
the courage necessary to martyrdom ? Let us be thank- 
ful that we are not led into this temptation. This re- 
minds me of another consideration, which ought to en- 
gage us to be content with our condition : let us con- 
sider our afflictions. Discontent is not always the child 
of affliction, for some people are determined at all ad- 
ventures to be unhappy, and to disturb the quiet of all 
about them. Sometimes imaginations of distant ills 
which may never come, and at other times trifling acci- 
dents of no signification at all, agitate the bosoms of un- 
happy mortals, who think it worth while to raise a tem- 
pest to kill a fly. No place., however pleasant, no in- 
heritance, however beautiful, can make such people hap- 
py : but the fault does not lie in the lot, but in the own- 
er of it. 

To people under affliction, I would give four words 
of advice ; do 3^ou consider the fitness of them. First, 
observe the false principle on which j^ou have founded 
your discontent. You have laid it down as a principle, 
that you ought to be free from all trouble in this pre- 
sent life. This is a bold step. It seems, Almighty God 
does not think so, for who among all his millions of 
creatures is not subject like you to pain, sickness, sor- 
row, and death ? Beside, this is an unjust principle. 
You have laid it down as a principle, that you ought 
to be perfectl}^ ^^^PPJ here. But who are you ? Have 



46 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDEISCE. 

you never tasted the forbidden fruit ? Does it become 
jou, a sinner, who have given yourself so many stabs, 
to complain of smart ? If it be true, as we are taught, 
that " the soul that sinneth, it shall die," and if you be 
that soul, all places short of the place of execution 
ought to make you cry with the Psalmist, Considering 
what I deserve, '• the liues are fallen unto me in pleasant 
places :" this is not '-'• the valley of the shadow of death," 
this is not the bottomless pit, my affliction is not the an- 
gel with the great chain in his hand. If I be not obsti- 
nate, my house may be a house of prayer, and my old 
pilloAv a gate of heaven. Moreover, this principle is 
selfish. The holy men, who are proposed to you for 
examples, rejoiced in tribulation, because the patience, 
content, and prudence, w^hich they exercised under their 
afflictions, instructed and edified others. They consider- 
ed themselves as parts of a whole, and submitted to suf- 
ferings not necessary to themselves for the sake of their 
brethren. Thus the death of Christ is the life of the 
religion of his afflicted followers. 

Let afflicted people observe, in the next place, the 
sufferings of others, and compare conditions. It is not 
wise to compare ourselves with ourselves, ourselves in 
sickness with ourselves in health, ourselves in old age 
with ourselves in youth, ourselves in disgrace with our- 
selves in reputation. Let sick people compare them- 
selves with other sick people, the old man on his crutch- 
es with the old man confined to his bed, the man neg- 
lected by his children, with the man under the frown of 
'his Almighty Judge. Such a comparison always tends 
to content, and always must do so as long as we can con- 
ceive any thing capable of increasing the load we car- 
ry. " Oh thou afflicted ! tossed with tempest and not 
comforted ? Come now and let us reason together." 
Hath '' God from above sent fire into 3'our bones ?" 
Hath he '■'- caused Sabbaths to be forgotten in Zion ? Is 
the law no more ?" Do your children say to you, 
where is corn and wine ? do your sucklings swoon in the 
streets for hunger, and pour out their soul into their 
mother's bosom ? Are you driven to eat your children 
of a span long? Have you, tender woman, full of pity, 



WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 47 

sodden your own children for meat? Is your skin 
black like an oven ? Is your affliction like a great sea- 
breach, that none can heal ? Ah ! nothing of all this : 
but something which, compared with all this, hardly de- 
serves the name of affliction. Oh, look short of these, 
look only into hospitals, mad-houses, and jails, and, com- 
paring your situation with theirs, adopt the text, " The 
lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; yea, I have 
a goodly heritage." 

Still, say you, we have our afflictions, and we do and 
must feel them. I believe so ; consider therefore a 
third article, the benefits you derive from affliction. Do 
you know what we most admire in you ? It is not your 
dress ; we could make a beast fme with trappings. It 
is not your abilities ; it would not be your abilities, if 
you had such powers as angels have, for indeed what 
but a fine creature is Gabriel to us ? A fine speculation, 
more beautiful than the rainbow to look at : but w^hat is 
it to us ? What we admire, and what w^e ought to ad- 
mire in man is that collection of fine feelings which 
make him a human creature, social and useful. Sym- 
pathy and fellow-feeling, tenderness of heart and pity 
for the ^wretched, compassion for your neighbours and 
reverence for your God, the melting eye, the soothing 
tone, the silver feature, the ingenious devices, the rap- 
id actions of a soul all penetrated with reason and reli- 
gion, these are the qualities we admire in you, and all 
these you learned in the school of affliction. Oh, I love 
the soul that must and will do good, the kind creature, 
that runs to the sick bed, I might rather say bedstead, 
of a poor neighbour, wipes away the moisture of a fe- 
ver, smooths the clothes, beats up the pillow, fills the 
pitcher, sets it within reach, administers only a cup of 
cold water ; but, in the true spirit of a disciple of Christ, 
becomes a fellow-worker with Christ in the administra- 
tion of happiness to mankind. Peace be with that good 
soul ! She also must come in due time into the condi- 
tion of her neighbour, and then may " the Lord 
strengthen her upon the bed of languishing, and," by 
some kind hand like her own, " make all her bed in her 
sickness." 



48 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH FROVIDEiVCE. 

Is it a benefit to understand the spirit, and see the 
beauty of the Holy Scriptures ? Afflictions teach Chris- 
tians the worth of their Bibles, and so wrap up their 
hearts in the oracles of God. The Bible is but an in- 
sipid book to us before afflictions bring us to feel the 
want of it, and then how many comfortable passages do 
we find, which lay neglected and unknown before ! I 
recollect an instance in a history of some, who fled from 
persecution in this country to that then wild desert, 
America. Among many other hardships, they were 
sometimes in such straits for bread, that the very crusts 
of their former tables in England would have been a 
dainty to them. Necessity drove the women and chil- 
dren to the seaside to look for a ship expected to bring 
them provision ; but no ship for many weeks appeared ; 
however they saw in the sand vast quantities of shell- 
fish, since called clams, a sort of muscles. Hunger im- 
pelled them to taste, and at length they fed aln^ost whol- 
ly on them, and to their own astonishment were as 
cheerful, fat, and lusty, as they had been in England with 
their fill of the best provisions. A worthy man, one 
day after they had all dined on clams without bread, 
returned God thanks for causing them to " suck of the 
abundance of the seas, and of treasures hid in the sand ;" 
a passage in Deuteronomy, a part of the blessing, with 
which Moses blessed the tribe of Zebulun before his 
death, a passage till then unobserved by the company, 
but which ever after endeared the writings of Moses to 
them. 

Finally : Consider afflictions in the light of prepara- 
tions for glory. Eternal duration, everlasting employ- 
ment, and a perfection of happiness, are loftj objects! 
for us frail men to aspire at ; and when we consider 
our extreme littleness, it seems presumptuous for such 
worms to expect such exaltation. I doubt whether we 
might presume to expect it without the express declar- 
ation of God ; however, I venture to affirm that afflic- 
tions have been the occasions of throwing great light 
upon this subject. Man is a creature of astonishing- 
powers ; but these powers lie hid in the breasts of all, 
like diamonds in a rock, till the convulsions of nature 



WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 49 

l)ring them to light. Hunger makes the infant cry, 
crying is exercise and makes him struggle and grow. 
When he grows up to play, the sting of a nettle or a 
bee gives him pain, and makes him fear ; fear teaches 
him caution, an hour's sickness gives him a lesson on 
the worth of health, and leads him to plan and to exe- 
cute means to preserve it. As dangers multiply, his 
powers of preventing, resisting, and subduing them break 
forth. Not content with remedying past ills, he fore- 
sees future ; there is no end of his invention, and there 
would be, if his life were not cut short, no end of the 
execution of his designs. All the great, all the useful, 
and all the ornamental works of art in the world were 
once nothing but ideas without substance in the minds 
of men, and who would have thought that the soul of 
one single Adam, our first father, could have contained 
the seeds of such an amazing quantity of fruit ! What 
a soul must that man have who formed, perhaps lying 
in pain on his pillow, the collecting of materials, ad- 
justing apartments, and providing funds for the support 
of a spacious hospital ! How many fine operations must 
his mind perform ! Fancy, pity, judgment cool and se- 
date, love to his fellow creatures quick and alive, and 
many more such eiforts must go to make up the gene- 
rous present to his country. The same may be said of 
all the works of mankind, and probably, could we trace 
them, we should find them the offspring of pain and sor- 
row. Man considered in this light seems a noble crea- 
ture ; it is a pity he should die to rise no more. But, 
passing this, we know God intends us to live in a future 
world, and we know that the school of affliction in this 
life is a necessary preparation for that, and lience it is 
that Scripture considers the man, who hath well under- 
stood the exercise of religious tempers, as a man ready 
to die. " Be ye ready ; they that were ready went in 
with the bridegroom." 

Let us finish. Christians, of all men, should be the 
least prone to discontent. A Christian, who hath God 
for his portion, and who, dissatisfied with that, renders 
himself unhappy about the little things of this life, be- 
haves as if he could not enjoy the day for want of a 



60 WE OUGHT TO BE CONTENT WITH PROVIDENCE. 

glowworm, or the ocean for want of one little drop 
more. How old are you, and how many years more 
have you to live, that you should be so anxious about 
this little remaining time ? What could prosperity do 
for some of you ? Behold, the day cometh, in which 
you must die, and then every thing will be indiflferent 
to you except the favour and friendship of your God. 
" Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth, 
therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almigh- 
ty." If he maketh sore, yet he bindeth up, though he 
woundeth, yet his hands make whole. '' He shall de- 
liver thee in six troubles, yea, in seven there shall no 
evil touch thee. Thou shalt come to thy grave in a 
full age, like as a shock of corn cometh in, in his sea- 
son. Lo this, we have searched it, so it is ; hear it, and 
know thou it for thy good." 

Thank God, says one (and let me not forget you), 
thank God, " the lines are fallen unto me in pleasant 
places ;" I am very content, and very happy ; I thrive 
and prosper in the world, and I live cheerfully on what 
Providence hath bestowed. But doth your pleasure 
proceed from your prosperity only, or doth it proceed 
from a conviction of that goodness of heart, which pros- 
perity produces in you ? Examine : doth not your pros- 
perity and pleasure resemble that of a fat ox in pasture ? 
and is there much more diiference between you and 
him, than that of shape and make? You eat and drink, 
and sleep in the lap of plenty ; but do you feel like a 
man and a Christian for the lean people over the hedge ? 
Alas ! without virtues that do good to your fellow-crea- 
tures, you are only fatting for slaughter, and your hun- 
gry relations will be glad when you die, that they may 
step into your lot, and cry, " The lines are fallen unto us 
in pleasant places, and we now have the goodly heri- 
tage." Where do you stand, when you make use of the 
text ; amidst your corn, your flock of sheep, or your 
bountiful feasts at home ? Alas ! poor man, what a child 
art thou in understanding ! You resemble a lord of a 
great estate got down into a gloomy hole, where some 
of his tenants' cattle drink, enchanted with a few white 
thorns and willows growing on the ragged edges of the 



%Ve ought to be content with providence. 51 

pit, having forgotten all the other parts of his estate, 
and shouting about this one pit, " The lines are fallen 
unto me in pleasant places ; yea, I have a goodly heri- 
tage." What would you think of such a man ? You 
would think him distracted, and seeing his distraction 
endanger his health and life, your humanity would for- 
get his rank, and you Avould hazard yourself to get him 
out. This nobleman is your picture. You are of high 
birth, you were made in the image of God. You rank 
with men, above all other animals, and only a little low- 
er than the angels. You have a large inheritance, an 
" inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fad- 
eth not away, reserved in heaven for you." How is it, 
that you have so forgot yourself as to sink your soul in- 
to a little earthly good, and, so to speak, to incorporate 
yourself with your flock of sheep, as silly and senseless 
as they ? You, lost sheep ! Do you mean to bury your- 
self alive in such a dirty pen ? What if your justly of- 
fended Creator should say, " Your fathers tempted, prov- 
ed me, and saw my work." Forty years long have I 
been grieved with you, and said. He is a man, who errs 
in his heart, he hath not known my ways. " I swear, 
he shall never enter into my rest !" Would to God, yon 
might recover yourself before this decree goes forth ! 
Would to God, you might say, " The Lord shall be the 
portion of mine inheritance, I will bless him for giving 
me counsel. I will set him always before me. I will 
kneel down before the Lord, my maker, for he is my 
God, and I am one of the people of his pasture and the 
sheep of his hand. To day I will hear his voice. He 
will show me the path of life ; in his presence is fullness 
^f joy, and at his right hand there are pleasures for ev- 
ermore." Then I may say without hesitation wtiat I 
could never utter before without exposing my folly, 
" The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places ; yea, I 
have a goodly heritage." God grant you this grace ! 
To him be honour and glory forever. Amen. 



DISCOURSE IV. 

TpE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION:^ 

l^T SAWS TO JV} 



LUKE xxi. 14, 15. 

Settle it therefore in your hearts^ not to meditate before what 
ye shall answer ; for I will give you a mouth and wisdom^ 
which all your adversaries shall not he able to gainsay nor 
resist. 

Wisdom is something to say, and mouth is ability to 
speak it ; wisdom is the testimony or evidence to be 
given by the apostles, when they should be brought before 
kings and rulers for Christ's name sake, and mouth is 
courage to deliver this testimony ; wisdom is the Gospel 
to be taught in synagogues, and confessed in prisons, and 
mouth is the gift of tongues, and all other means neces- 
sary to publish it through the whole world. This was 
the wise and generous intention of Christ, and into his 
views his apostles most heartily entered, and, immedi- 
ately after Pentecost, when ''Jesus was received up 
into heaven, and sat down on the right hand of God," 
they went forth, and preached every where. 

Here is an ugly word in the text, adversaries., enemies, 
and it is not in my power to conceal what I blush to 
declare, that is, that there always have been, and yet are 
a great number of foolish and w icked people, who are 
enemies to the redemption of mankind. Had you never 
seen one of these enemies, one ignorant man who hated 
instruction, one wicked woman who hated reformation, 
one disobedient child who hated religion ; had you nev- 
er seen a despiser of those that are good : yet it would 



THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK. 63 

not be in my power to conceal what the text says, and 
what follows ; " Ye shall be betrayed both by parents, 
and brethren, and kinsfolks, and friends ; and some of 
you shall they cause to be put to death. And ye shall 
be hated of all men for my name's sake." The Gospel, 
however, suffers nothing by the enmity of such men ; 
for the bare sight of the characters of those, who cruci- 
fied Christ, persecuted his apostles, and opposed the 
kind intentions of our heavenly Father to us in giving 
us the Gospel, is a recommendation of the Gospel. 
The Jews killed the Lord Jesus ; but they had long- 
before habituated themselves to shed the blood of 
their own prophets ; they persecuted the apostles ; but 
they were " contrary to all men :" they forbade the sal- 
vation of the Gentiles ; but they " displeased God," and 
" wrath came upon them to the uttermost." And now-a- 
days, what kind of men are the}^, who " resist the truth?"' 
Are they not '' men of corrupt minds, covetous, boasters, 
proud, blasphemers, fierce, lovers of pleasure more than 
lovers of God, laden with sins, led away with divers 
lusts, whose folly is manifest unto all men ?" What 
sort of a gospel must come from heaven to please men 
of this kind ? One must have a gospel according to 
cruelty, another a gospel according to pride, a third a 
gospel according to divers lusts ; but a gospel according 
to truth and holiness must be disagreeable to them, for 
the same reason that a bill for the payment of his debts 
is disagreeable to a dishonest man. 

The Lord Jesus promises in the text to make the 
mouth and wisdom of his apostles irresistible, and I have 
the proof of the accomplishment of his promise here in 
my hand. You know this little book. It contains the 
four Gospels, or rather one Gospel related by four credi- 
ble witnesses, the wisdom of God imparted by his Spirit 
to the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ ; and in spite of 
all the interest the wicked have had to destroy this book, 
and all the power they have employed to rob the world 
of this treasure of wisdom and knowledge, here it is, un- 
damaged at the distance of seventeen hundred years 
after it was written. Kings may set themselves up for 
gods upon earth, " rulers may take counsel together 
5* 



34 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

against the Lord and against his anointed," heathens 
may rage, and common people may " imagine a vain 
thing ;" but '' he that sitteth in the heavens shall have 
them in derision." flis " decree hath set his king upon 
his holy hill of Zion," and shall give him the "•' heathen 
for his inheritance, and the uttermost parts of the earth 
for his possession." 

The doctrine of our text is taught by our Saviour, I 
think, three times in the course of his ministry in almost 
the same words; the first in the ordination sermon, 
which he delivered to his twelve apostles, when he 
first appointed them to teach ; this you may read in the 
tenth chapter of Matthew. The second time was in a 
discourse addressed to an innumerable multitude of peo- 
ple, or, to speak more accurately, in a discourse in the 
hearing of an innumerable multitude, the first part of 
which was addressed to his disciples, and the rest to all 
the company ; you may read this in the twelfth chapter 
of Luke, and remark particularly the first, and the forty- 
first verses. The doctrine of our text is in the first part 
of that sermon. The third time was when he was with 
his disciples coming from the temple on the mount of 
Olives. Some of them were speaking of the beauty of 
the building, and our Lord took occasion to speak of the 
destruction of it, and of the city in which it stood, and 
foretold the persecutions and afflictions of his disciples ; 
and in order to prevent their fears, and even their pru- 
dence in giving evidence of his Gospel, he strictly charg- 
ed them to '' settle it in their hearts not to premeditate 
what they should speak ;" but, saith he, " speak ye 
whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, for it is not 
ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost." Remark two words. 
Observe the word hour. Our Lord fixes the time for 
this inspiration y it was " when they should be brought 
before kings and rulers, councils and synagogues, and 
while they should be in any manner bearing their testi- 
mony. There is therefore no reason, as there is no 
necessity for Christians to suppose, that this promise i| 
made to all good men to the end of the world. Observe 
further, it is said (this is the account given in Mark), 
*^ It is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost," or, as Ma^t- 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION. 55 

thew expresses it, " It is not ye that speak, but the Spi- 
rit of your Father that speaketh in you." From these 
passages, as well as from many more like them, we con- 
clude that the Holy Spirit extended his inspiration both 
to the matter taught by the apostles, and to the words 
in which they taught it. " We speak," said the apostle 
of the Gentiles, '' in the words, which the Holy Ghost 
teacheth." The conclusion is equally strong for the 
words in which they wrote their testimony. 

Let us attend to the subject. I am going this even- 
ing to try to engage you to love the Bible, both on ac- 
count of the w isdom contained it, and the good which 
you derive from it ; and in order to this I shall endeav- 
our to convince you . . . that the holy Scriptures were 
inspired by the only wise God . . . and that the truths 
contained in them, have an irresistible power to answer 
the end for which they w^ere given. O Almighty God, 
our heavenly Father ! "• who at sundry times, and in di- 
vers manners, didst speak in time past unto the fathers 
by the prophets, and hast in these last days spoken unto 
us by thy Son," grant we may '' give the most earnest 
heed to that great salvation, v»'hich at the first began 
to be spoken by the Lord, and was confirmed unto us by 
them that heard him ;" thou, irresistible God ! " bear- 
ing them witness with signs and wonders, and divers 
miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost, according to thine 
own will !" 

My brethren, signs and miracles, and gifts of the Holy 
Ghost there are without number, to prove the truth of 
our holy religion in general, and of the inspiration of 
the holy Scriptures in particular. There are learned 
proofs to satisfy the doubts of learned men, and there 
are plain proofs to satisfy plain men ; there were pro- 
phecies fulfilled in the person of Christ to satisfy his 
countrymen in his own time, and there are prophecies 
concerning Christ and his church, the Jews and other 
nations, to satisfy people of all nations and in all ages ; 
there were miracles wrought by Jesus Christ to satisfy 
those who inquired at his mouth, '' who gave him au- 
thority," and which were so satisfactory to the inquirers, 
that they could not help exclaiming, '' ^his is, of a truth, 



56 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

that prophet that should come into the world;'' and 
though there are no miracles now, yet there are irre- 
sistible motives to engage us to say to him, " Lord, to 
whom shall we go ? thou hast the words of eternal life, 
and we believe and are sure, that thou art the Christ, 
the son of the living God." All these I lay aside, for 
the same reason that you have left your money at home, 
you have no occasion for it in this barn. I choose one 
proof of the inspiration of the Holy Scripture, and that 
is, that it is a o-ooi^ book, and therefore the gift of a good 
God. I do not mean a good book in common with other 
good books ; but a book so true as to have no falsehood 
in it, so wise as to recommend nothing foolish, and con- 
taining a religion so good as to have nothing weak or 
wicked in it. A common good book, like a good man, 
is not without its defects, but good upon the whole ; but 
this good Gospel resembles a good angel, perfect without 
a mixture of imperfection. I confirm this notion of 
Scripture by the words of the apostle Paul ; " All Scrip- 
ture given by inspiration of God is profitable for doc- 
trine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righ- 
teousness, able to make the man of God perfect, thor- 
oughly furnished unto all good works, wise unto salva- 
tion through faith in Jesus Christ." Further, I lay aside 
all the books of Scripture except the four Gospels, be- 
cause if the four Gospels be true, the Old Testament, 
and the remainder of the New must be true also ; and as 
is the complexion of the one, so is the colour of the 
other. 

Are you aware Avhat a dangerous task the man would 
undertake, who should presume to deny either that the 
Gospel is good, or that, though it be good, yet it was not 
inspired by God ? If it be not good, it must be wicked ; 
but what order of bad men could write such a book? 
Do you know any ignorant people v/ho could do so ? Is 
it conceivable that misers, or drunkards, or swearers, or 
liars, or any other sort of profligate people, could or 
would compose such a book as this ? It is both above 
their virtue, and above their invention. No, the Gospel 
is not the production of such men. Matthew was not a 
blasphemer of God, Mark was not a slanderer of man- 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION. 5T: 

kind, Luke was not a stupid ignorant man, John was not 
an artful propagator of false and idle tales. Would the 
profligate forsake father and mother, houses and lands ; 
would the wicked expose themselves to poverty, and 
ridicule, and imprisonment, and death, to give credit to 
a lie ? If the hook were written by good men, then it 
was inspired, for the writers expressly declare that it 
was not they who spoke, hut the Holy Ghost who taught 
them what to say. A man who invents and spreads a 
false report is wicked ; but his wickedness becomes ten- 
fold more, if he affirms the God of truth spoke in him, 
it was not he himself that spoke, but the Spirit of the 
Father of all mankind. In one word, the apostles were 
good men, and their testimony ought to have been cred- 
ited even before the contents of their message had been 
examined by such as had personal knowledge of them. 
For our parts, we ask no favour for men, who are above 
the want of any ; and we are going to examine the Gos- 
pel without regard to the characters of the writers, as 
if the book had been brought to us in the bill of a bird 
flying with it into this assembly. 

Though we do not avail ourselves of the characters 
of the writers, yet this article must have great weight 
with every reasonable inquirer. There were at the 
time great numbers of witnesses, and Christ was seen 
after his resurrection from the dead, " of above five 
hundred brethren at once." Now here are four credi- 
ble witnesses, though in general it is allowed that " the 
testimony of two men is true," and the law of Moses 
allows the sufficiency of two witnesses, and requires no 
more than three in capital cases. Our four evangelists 
are men of good character, virtuous and good men, whose 
testimony would obtain credit in any court in the world. 
There is also an exact harmony among the evangelists ; 
there are differences, but no contradictions ; though it 
is very clear, that the four had not consulted together, 
that one had not read the Gospel written by another, 
and that John, the last writer, who had probably read 
the other three Gospels, took no pains to agree in every 
circumstance with the other three. Suppose yourselves 
sitting as jurymen in a court; suppose four witnesses to 



58 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

come in and relate the same fact with the same circum- 
stances in the very same words, and you would instantly 
perceive that they had consulted together, and that their 
testimony had the air of a forgery. Suppose, on the 
contrary, four witnesses relating a history in the manner 
of the evangelists, and their very differences are argu- 
ments in favour of the truth of their testimony. The 
differences are only small circumstances of time or 
place ; but their agreement in persons and facts is exact 
and convincing. Our evangelists persisted to their death 
in attesting the same facts, and there is no instance of 
any one having ever denied them. Observe further, 
they bore witness not in a cause of their own, but in 
that of Jesus Christ, who had he been an impostor could 
never reward them for their fidelity. They had no in- 
terest in reporting falsehood ; on the contrary, all their 
worldly interest lay on the other side. Nor were our 
evangelists credulous men, easily imposed upon ; they 
discovered a backwardness to believe Christ himself. 
They were eye-witnesses, and sensible men- Collect 
these nine characters of the witnesses of the life and 
doctrine, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, and you 
will perceive an irresistible argument for the truth of 
the Christian religion. I repeat these characters again. 
Observe the number . . the virtue . . the harmony . . the 
constancy of the evangelists . . not in their own cause . . 
having no interest in falsehood . . far from prejudice 
and credulity . . being eye-witnesses . . and men full of 
prudence and good sense. In pleading for the truth of 
Christianity we are in the condition of men of immense 
riches, who lay aside the far greater part for the sake 
of tasting and enjoying a little. We lay aside, for the 
present, the characters of the evangelists, and attend to 
that single proof of their inspiration, which rises out of 
the goodness of the Gospel itself We contend, the 
evangelists wrote by inspiration of God, and the good- 
ness of what they wrote proves their inspiration. 

It is an undeniable fact, that Jesus Christ promised 
extraordinary assistance to his apostles. " Settle it 
therefore in your hearts, not to meditate before what ye 
sjiall answer ; for I will give you a mouth and wi^dom^ 



WRlTTfcN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION, ^9 

which all your adversaries shall not be able to gainsay 
nor resist. Take no thought how or what ye shall speak, 
for what ye shall speak shall be given you ; for it is not 
ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which 
speaketh in you." Nothing can be more plain and ex- 
press, and less liable to mistake than this promise ; and 
the subject is explained at large in the last discourse of 
our Lord to his disciples, which is recorded in the four- 
teenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth chapters of John, where 
Christ promises the Comforter under the description of 
the *' Spirit of Truth, to testify of him." This was a 
great promise, and the character of Christ depended on 
the accomplishment of it. 

Observe again, that we have a clear history of the ac- 
complishment of this promise in the second chapter of 
Acts, six weeks after the resurrection of Christ, in the 
same city in which he was put to death, in the presence 
of " devout men of every nation under heaven," and 
which was accompanied with so much conviction, that 
the very crucifiers of Christ " gladly received the word," 
and the " same day there were added" to the Christian 
faith " about three thousand souls." This was not a 
sudden start, but a cool deliberate act, for " they con- 
tinued steadfastly in the apostles' doctrine and fellowship, 
and in breaking of bread, and in prayers." 

Moreover, the apostles expressly pretended to a di- 
vine inspiration. Thus Paul : "I certify you, brethren, 
that the gospel which was preached of me, is not after 
man, for I neither received it of man, neither was I 
taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus Christ." They 
not only pretended to be inspired to preach, but also to 
write ; not only to be inspired with ideas, but to be di- 
rected in the choice of words proper to express them ; 
" God hath revealed things unto us by his Spirit ; which 
things also we speak, not in the words which man's wis- 
dom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." 
Divine inspiration, extending both to matter and words, 
was of much more importance to their writings than to 
their sermons, because their writings were to serve for 
a perfect rale of faith and practice to all Christians to 
the end of the world. On these accounts they prefer- 



fJoO THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

red themselves before the prophets, and said, " God hath 
set in the church, first apostles, secondly prophets, third- 
ly teachers," agreeably to the instruction of their divine 
Master, who had taught them, that the least apostle (for 
so we understand the words) was greater than John the 
Baptist, though " among them that were born of women, 
there had not risen a greater man than John." God 
hath set in the church, primarily, apostles, secondarily 
(in the second order), prophets, and so on. Had the 
apostles been only inspired to preach, and not to write, 
they would have been inferior to the prophets ; but 
-having the same assistance, and more miraculous pow- 
ers, and being employed to propagate a more noble and 
more durable religion than that of the Jews, they as- 
sumed the rank due to their condition. Of the four 
evangelists, two of them, Matthew and John, were com- 
panions of Christ, and John was related to him, and be- 
fore he became acquainted with him was a disciple of 
John the Baptist ; then very young, and when he wrote 
his Gospel, very much in years. Our Lord loved him 
beyond his other disciples, placed an entire confidence 
in him, and not only admitted him, with only two more, 
to see the resurrection of the daughter of Jairus, the 
transfiguration on the mount, the agony in the garden, 
but also committed his mother to his care while he hung 
on the cross. Mark, or John Mark, as he is called, was 
the son of a Mary, who dwelt at Jerusalem, and at whose 
house the christians held their assemblies. He was 
cousin to Barnabas, and Peter was familiarly acquainted 
with him and his family; for when he came from prison, 
and knocked at the door, Rhoda, a damsel in the house, 
knew his voice. Mirk was a son or disciple of Peter, 
and travelled sometimes with Paul, and sometimes with 
Barnabas. This evangelist wrote his Gospel from Peter 
and Barnabas, and he was the same to them as Timothy 
was to Paul. He wrote his Gospel for the use of the 
Romans, as Matthew did his for the use of the Jews. 
Luke was by birth a heathen, and by profession a phy- 
sician, a constant traveller with Paul, and his Gospel v/as 
delivered unto him by those, " who from the beginning 
were eye-witnesses and ministers of the word," and he 



Written by divine inspiration. 61 

himself " had a perfect understanding of all things from 
the very first." When we affirm that these four men 
wrote hy inspiration, we mean that the Spirit of God 
preserved them from all error, infused into their minds 
some ideas, enabled them to retain and recollect others, 
to understand the whole, and to express all in a just and 
proper manner, exactly as Moses wrote what he had 
seen, what he had heard, what he had read, and what 
God imparted to him, making in the whole a body of in- 
formation, far above the invention of any one man, and 
truly and properly ascribed to inspiration of God. 

Many are the characters of inspiration, and the four 
Gospels have them all. A book pretending to come 
from God must be wise, true, powerful to answer its end, 
and so on ; because God is a wise, a just, a faithful, a 
powerful Being, and it would be a gross insult upon such 
a being to attribute folly and injustice to him. For this 
reason the Psalmist saith, " All thy works shall praise 
thee, O Lord ;" for every work of God is known to be 
his by certain characters which resemble his perfections. 
If therefore the Lord be " righteous in all his ways, and 
holy in all his works," we must examine whether the 
Gospel bears this character. Is it a righteous, a holy, a 
just, a good book ? Doth it teach us a just and good re- 
ligion ? This is a question, which the feelings of all 
mankind put, and to which the Gospel is able to give a 
most satisfactory answer. I am going to show you that 
the Gospel teaches us a good morality . . . and good mo- 
tives to practise it. Hence we shall infer, that none 
but bad men can refuse to embrace the gospel of our 
Lord Jesus Christ. 

By morality I mean the doctrine of the duties of life, 
and by calling this morality good, I mean to affirm that it 
is just, virtuous, proper, and the cause of happiness. As 
this is too general, we will examine particulars. For 
example, morality being a rule of practice must be cleai\ 
It is a great fault in masters giving orders, to be obscure. 
Evfen a willing servant may err through the doubtful 
meaning of a direction, and in such a case we ought not 
to tax him with carelessness, but ourselves for not speak- 
ing clearly and plainly. This is one proof of the good- 
6 



62 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

ness of the morality of the Gospel, that it neither is, nor 
can be misunderstood. A man desires to be informed 
what God expects him to do towards himself. The Gos- 
pel tells him, God requires him to fear him, to love 
him, to confide in him, to imitate him, to pray to him, 
to treat him as the first cause, and the chief good. A 
man desires to know what Jesus Christ expects of him. 
The Gospel informs him, that he expects to be heard, to 
have his doctrine examined and believed, his life imi- 
tated, and himself " honoured by all men as they honour 
the Father," to be treated as the Teacher, the Saviour, 
the Judge, and the Friend of mankind. One wishes to 
know how he ought to conduct himself to his neigh- 
bours. The Gospel tells him, '' All things whatsoever 
you would that men should do to you, do ye even so to 
them, for this is the law and the prophets." Another 
wishes to know what conduct he ought to observe to his" 
enemies. The Gospel says, " Love your enemies, bless 
them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and 
pray for them which despitefully use you and persecute 
you." Another asks, How ought I to manage myself? 
The Gospel answers, '' If thy right eye cause thee to 
olTend, pluck it out, and cast it from thee ; if thy right 
hand cause thee to oifend, cut it off, and cast it from 
thee ; it is better for thee to enter into life with one 
eye, than having two eyes to be cast into hell-fire." 
These duties are so clear that all the world understand 
them ; therefore Christians love the morality of the Gos- 
pel, and therefore the wicked hate it. Clearness is one 
character of goodness, and the morality of the Gospel 
bath it. 

Morality being a rule of action for imperfect men, 
must be practicable. Nothing shows the weakness of a 
lawgiver more than prescribing impossible duties, duties 
beyond the power of those to perform, on whom they 
are enjoined. This is always the case when too many 
in number are required to be done in a time not suffi- 
cient for the performance of them, and when services 
too hard and difficult in their nature are required of 
those, who have not powers equal to the task. If the 
Gospel required as many duties to be done in ten years 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION. 63 

as would take twelve ; or if it exacted as great a per- 
fection of man as an angel is capable of rendering; 
in either of these cases it would be unfit for us, and con- 
sequently he, who should require us to practise it, would 
discover his folly. Christian morality, is a perfect rule 
of action ; it is not accommodated to the imperfections 
of any man, but it requires us to take the perfect God 
for our example ; "• Be ye perfect, even as your Father 
which is in heaven is perfect." At the same time it 
encourageth the most feeblfe and faltering soul ; ''For if 
there be first a willing mind, it is accepted according to 
that a man hath, and not according to that he hath not." 
In perfect agreement with this, it is said of our Lord, 
" A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax 
shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto 
victory." This is a second character of Christian mo- 
rality, it is performable, such duty as may be done, and 
on this account we pronounce it good, just, and right, 
and tending to happiness. 

A good morality is universal^ and binds all alike, with- 
out partiality and preference. The Gospel requires us 
to be just and good ; but it informs us, God is just and 
good. It teacheth us to be mild and humble ; but it as- 
sures us Jesus Christ himself was " meek and lowly in 
heart." It requires us to be inoffensive and useful, but 
it informs us that " the apostles of Christ were gentle, 
even as a nurse cherishing her children ; behaving them- 
selves holily, and justly, and unblamably, willing to have 
imparted not the Gospel of God only, but also their own 
souls." It requires not only children to obey their pa- 
rents, but " fathers not to provoke their children to 
wrath, but to bring them up in the nurture and admoni- 
tion of the Lord." It not only requires servants to obey 
their masters, but " masters to forbear threatening, 
knowing that their master also is in heaven," and that 
" there is no respect of persons with him." To use the 
language of our Lord, he hath '^ left his house, 
and given to every man his work, and commanded the 
porter to watch. What I say unto you, I say unto all, 
Watch," The morality of Christ is addressed to all, 
and this is the excellence of it. It is as free from par- 



64 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

tiality as it is from obscurity. In the world, great men 
have one law for themselves, and another for their de- 
pendents : servants have a law of negligence for them- 
selves, and another law, a law of fidelity, for their mas- 
ters. All bad men live by one rule, and exact another 
of the rest of their fellow-creatures, and therein they 
discover their injustice. The duties of religion are not 
so : no man is so great as to be above law, no man is so 
mean as to render his service officious and unaccepta- 
ble. In this manner pursue the subject of Christian mo- 
rality, and you will find that strictly true of the Gospel, 
which an apostle said of the Law, which is incorporated 
into the Gospel : it is holy, just, and good : it is spiritu- 
al ; it is / who am carnal, sold under sin : yet my ha- 
tred of what I do, is equal to " consenting unto the law 
that it is good." 

The chief excellence of divine morality is, that it 
supports itself without any foreign aid. It is not a good 
practice upheld by bad or doubtful motives ; but it is re- 
ligion grounded on religion, and always able to maintain 
itself without any assistance from accidents, and remote 
and precarious causes. For this reason we call Chris- 
tian morality good, because it is enforced by good mo- 
tives. It may happen, it often hath happened, that the 
duties of Christianity have fallen in with the interests of 
mankind, and it hath suited their convenience more to 
perform than to neglect them. In this case base motives 
have given birth to laudable actions, and men have done 
right for the sake of what was wrong. This is not Chris- 
tianity, this is an abuse of Christianity ; and on what an 
uncertain ground would the duties of the Christian reli- 
gion rest, were they left to such shifts as these ! Alas ! 
how often doth it happen to be more convenient to ne- 
glect our duty than to do it ; to say of Christ, " Crucify 
him, crucify him ; not this man, but Barabbas," rather 
than to render such homage as is due to him ! It may 
happen, it doth daily happen, that the morality of the 
Gospel cannot be practised without exposing ourselves 
to difficulty, danger, and distress. What is to support 
the christian character then ? The smiles of the world '^ 
Alas, they frown and threaten ! The hope of gain ? No, 



WRlTTEir BY DIVINE INSi^IRATlOIT. 65 

liere is nothing to be gained, but every thing at stake, 
and all likely to be lost. Will our own passions and 
senses, right eyes, right hands, right feet, favourite sen- 
sations, will they support the practice of Christianity ? 
Quite the contrary : the heart will join with the world, 
conspire against God, dethrone the Saviour, and tram- 
ple upon his law ; " without will be fightings, within 
fears." The primitive Christians experienced many 
hardships, and surmounted many difficulties, in order to 
practise the duties of their religion : yet they " took 
joyfully the spoiling of their goods ;" because they were 
supported by motives good and religious like the prac- 
tice itself: " Ye took joyfully the spoiling of your goods, 
knowing in yourselves that ye have in heaven a better 
and an enduring substance." 

A motrve is that which hath power to move, and a 
religious motive is that in religion which causeth a man 
to practise the duties of religion. What a powerful 
motive to practise is the doctrine of future punishment ! 
Jesus Christ taught a state of future punishments, A 
Christian examines this doctrine, considers it in the 
light in which Jesus Christ has placed it, not as an ar- 
bitrary exercise of power by a being above control, 
but as a sanction necessary to a law, and thus views hell 
as a great prison, or rather a scaffold for the execution 
of incorrigible criminals. Being persuaded that such a 
state is just and proper, his fear is excited, and as he 
believes he fears, as he fears he flees : his flight is in 
proportion to his fear, and his fear is of the same 
strength as his faith. Our Lord often applies this truth 
of religion to practice, and uses it as a motive to duty. 
" Whosoever shall say to his brother. Thou fool, shall be 
in danger of hell-fire." " If thy right hand oftend thee, 
cut it off and cast it from thee." Why ? " Because it 
is profitable for thee that one of thy members should 
perish, and not that thy whole body should be cast into 
hell." 'Tear God rather than man." Why? What should 
move me to do so ? Because man can only kill the body, 
but God " is able to destroy both soul and body in hell." 
Let every man exercise his several ability. Why ? Be- 
cause an " unprofitable servant shall be cast into outer 
6* 



66 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

darkness, where shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." 
Feed the hungry, clothe the naked, do unto one of the 
least of my brethren as you would do unto me. Why ? 
What should engage me to do so ? Because " the King 
shall say unto them, who did not minister unto him" in 
his members, " Inasmuch as ye did it not unto one of the 
least of these, ye did it not unto me." Depart, cursed 
man ! depart from me, cursed woman ! " Go away into 
everlasting punishment !" Thus Christ taught, and this 
word. Depart ! hath been in all ages since a thunder- 
clap in the ears of Christians ; and though we acknowl- 
edge it is one of the lowest motives, yet we affirm it is 
far more powerful and effectual than all the boasted mo- 
tives of heathen moralists. My brethren, heathens have 
taught duties of life, but heathens could never set their 
rules a-going; they had not a power to give their 
good advice eflfect ; and when we compare the least mo- 
tive of Christianity with the greatest powers of heathen- 
ism, we triumph over them in the language of a Jewish 
proverb, " Is not the gleaning of the grapes of Ephraim 
better than the vintage of Abiezer ?" 

Another motive is the doctrine of future rewards. A 
view of this supported Moses, who " had respect unto 
the recompense of reward." A prospect of this sup- 
ported Christ, " who, for the joy that was set before 
him, endured the cross, despising the shame." Our 
Lord often urged this motive to his disciples, sometimes 
this alone, but more frequently this in contrast with fu- 
ture punishments, and both heightened with many cir- 
cumstances of time, as " at the end of the world ;" place, 
as " before my Father which is in heaven ;" company, 
as before " all the holy angels, and all nations." The 
rewards are exactly such as a virtuous and good man 
would wish to receive, and such as he ought in justice 
to receive : the approbation of God, the best Judge of 
worth ; the calm pleasure of reflection, the constant en- 
joyment of knowledge and virtue in perfection ; behold- 
ing universal justice administered by the Governor of 
the world to all his creatures ; " tribulation and anguish 
upon every soul of man that doeth evil ; but glory, hon- 
our, and peace to every man that worketh good ; for 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION". €t 

there is no respect of persons with God." Heaven ex- 
cites hope, as hell stirs up fear, and both, considered in 
firm persuasion of the day of judgment, are powerful 
motives to Christian obedience. Faith realizes these 
truths, and brings these distant objects near, so that a 
Christian seems to himself sometimes to hear the trum- 
pet, to see the heavens pass away, and the dead rise, to 
rise from the dead himself, and to " sit in heavenly pla- 
ces with Christ Jesus;" to be dead, and to have a " life 
hid with Christ in God." 

Sometimes our Lord binds his morality on his disci- 
ples by the soft and silken bands of love^ touches their 
tender feelings, and says, " Love me, and love one anoth- 
er, as I have loved you," making his love to us a mo- 
tive to engage us to love him, and to perform all the 
duties of life. What a motive, what an irresistible mo- 
tive to this ! The love of Christ to us is pure in its prin- 
ciple, for it rises out of wisdom ; rich in its effects, for 
all the benefits conferred on us by him are effects of his 
esteem ; it is uniform and invariable, not eager to-day 
and indifferent to-morrow, but " the same yesterday, 
and to-day, and forever ;" it is peculiar to himself, above 
the tenderness of a parent to a child, beyond the esteem 
of the husband to the wife of his bosom, or his friend 
which is as his own soul ; a love above what mortals 
know, peculiar to himself, suited to the dignity of his 
nature, having breadth, and length, and depth, and 
height ; a love which passeth knowledge, an esteem 
longer in duration, stronger in production, extending to 
all our interests and beyond all our conceptions. There 
are two things remarkable in the manner of our Lord's 
treating this subject. The first is the determinate man- 
ner in which he speaks of its effects. His love produces 
ours, and our love to him produces infallible effects. 
" If a man love me, he will keep my words. He that 
hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that 
loveth me." The other is the affecting manner in 
which he connects together love and obedience : " If ye 
love me, keep my commandments." At the sound of 
this word if^ the Christian starts ; all the tenderness and 
gratitude of his soul move to meet his duty ; he con- 



66 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOlC, 

ceives a horror for disobedience, because it make hisf 
love suspected ; he turns all his attention to render his 
christian duties just, complete, beautiful, and strongly 
expressive of the inward esteem from which they flow ; 
and he endeavours to give his morality a refinement and 
delicacy suited to the nature of that grand and noble 
virtue, from which it proceeds. Doth he fall into sin ? 
No motive like this to make him rise; ''If a man love 
me, he will keep my words ?" Doth he feel himself 
indifferent to duty ? No motive like this ; " If ye iove 
me, keep my commandments." How can I forgive my- 
self for not loving Christ ? But I canaot prove I do love 
Christ any other way than by keeping his command- 
ments. 1 will therefore keep his commandments both 
in gratitude to him, and in mercy to myself. For what 
is disobedience but the parent of a thousand cruel doubts 
and uncertainties in my soul ? 

In this manner we might go through many other mo- 
tives, and all would tend to establish the truth we have 
laid down, that is, that the gospel was written by Divine 
inspiration, and that, among a thousand other evidences, 
the goodness of the book puts the matter out of all 
doubt. It lays down good rules of living, and it gives 
the rules the force of law by motives good like them- 
selves. The rules live in the life, because the affec- 
tions of the heart compel the obedience of the life ; and 
the affections of the heart proceed from a persuasion in 
the mind, which persuasion is produced by the truth of 
the doctrine, the author of ail which is the blessed Spir- 
it of God, to whom Christians attribute, as to the first 
cause of their religion, the honour and glory of the 
whole. 

To bring the matter to a conclusion, I affirm, and I 
flatter myself you will not contradict it, that this book is 
good for other men, and good for you in every possible 
condition of life. Bad as the world is, and wickedly as 
most men live, few, perhaps none, are so far gone as 
not to wish other men virtuous. The prince requires 
virtue of the people, and never engages them in any 
service, no not in the most bloody undertakings, without 
some plausible pretences of justice in the name of God^. 



Written by divine iNSPiRATifiN. 6^ 

The people expect, at least they recommend virtue to 
their magistrates, and execrate injustice and impiety ill 
their superiors ; robes of office, say they, should never 
conceal wickedness ; they do not adorn, but expose a 
man in power, who should be a guardian of virtue and 
not an example of vice. Parents recommend virtue to 
their children, and children expect their parents to be 
virtuous. " If the buyer saith, it is naught, it is nayght,'** 
yet when he hath bought, and is become a seller, " he 
boasteth :" that is to say, he expects a commodity truly 
and honestly when he buys, and would reproach the sell- 
er for attempting to defraud him, though when he be- 
comes a seller himself, he changes his language with 
his condition. Even the most dull and stupid of man- 
kind dictate laws of virtue to others, and the poor mas- 
ter of only one poor boy advises the boy to be a good 
boy, and do his duty. It should seem then, I am not 
alone in recommending religion to you, for you all re- 
commend it to one another, and to the whole world ex- 
cept yourselves. I will suppose a case. Imagine your- 
selves assembled to-day, by desire of all your country- 
men of every rank, to determine a question of conse- 
quence, whethe'r they should all live by the rules of the 
Gospel, or by the maxims of the world. Suppose some 
child of the devil, some *' enemy of all righteousness, 
full of all subtil ty and all mischief," should stand up, and 
^' seek to turn us away from the faith," by recommend- 
ing murder, adultery, theft, lying, impiety, and all kinds 
of debauchery and wickedness, and should &ay, " All the 
glory of the world, riches, honours, pleasures, will you 
obtain by practising these profitable exercises." Would 
not every one of you say, " Get thee hence, Satan : 
away with such a fellow from the earth, for it is not fit 
that he should live." The father would say, "Away 
with such a fellow," he would introduce discord into 
my family, and teach one of my sons to become a Cain, 
and to kill his brother. The mother would cry, " Away 
with such a fellow," he would rob my daughter of het 
innocence and her character, and bring down my grey 
hairs and her father's grey hairs '^ with sorrow to the 
grave, seeing that his life is bound up in her life*" 



^0 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK. 

Each child would say, " Away with such a fellow," whaf 
good would riches and honours do me, and what plea- 
sure could I take in them, if I were so unhappy as to see 
" evil come upon my father." You would have no pa- 
tience to see this bad man decoy one little boy out of 
the church into the world ; you would say, ^' Away with 
such a fellow, we have a father, an old man, and this is 
a child of his old age, a little one, and his brother is 
dead, and he alone is left of his mother, and his father 
loveth him, and it shall come to pass, that when he seeth 
that the lad is not with us, that he will die." All these 
are only the inconveniences of a moment, and there are 
yet stronger reasons for resisting such a tempter as this : 
there are all the agonies of guilt in the article of death, 
and throughout a boundless eternity. I am certain, you 
would all advise one another to pass a vote for all ranks 
and degrees of men to make this good book the rule of 
their action. You need not be ashamed to present it on 
your knees to a prince : you might safely recommend it 
to a judge : one verse of it would turn your country in- 
to a paradise, a verse which it is a shame not to know 
by heart : " All things whatsoever you would that men 
should do to you, do ye even so to them, for this is the 
law and the prophets." It is not this rule of action, it 
is the want of it that fills every parish, and every house, 
with so many complaints of injustice. It was the want 
of this, that made the wise man say, and hath made ma- 
ny a man since his time say, "• I considered all the oppress- 
ions that are done under the sun, and beheld the tears 
of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter, 
and on the side of their oppressors there was power to 
relieve their miseries, but they had no comforter. I 
saw the place of judgment that wickedness was there, 
and the place of righteousness that iniquity was there." 
Man, what hath man done by violating the law of his 
Creator? This was the question put by God to the first 
sinner : — " What is this that thou hast done ?" The his- 
tory of all the crimes committed in the world is the long 
but proper answer to this question. What hath man ob- 
tained by sin ? An ability to " cause his heart to des- 
pair, for all his days are sorrows, and his travel grief, 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION. 71 

yea, his heart taketh not rest in the night." Let any 
man show such effects caused by a close attachment to 
the morality of the Gospel of Christ. 

Is there any person in this assembly, who hath the 
face to recommend justice to others, and the heart to 
practise injustice himself? I hope not. This book is 
good for each of you in every possible condition of life. 
It is good by its laws of temperance and chastity, for the 
health of the body : it is '' health to the countenance, 
and marrow to the bones." It is good by its laws of in- 
dustry, frugality, and abstinence for lengthening out life, 
and procuring and blessing the enjoyments of it : " length 
of days is in the right hand of this wisdom, and in the 
left hand riches and honour. The ways are ways of 
pleasantness, and all the paths are peace." It is, by its 
laws of fidelity, gentleness, and goodness, the highest 
ornament of character : it is " life unto the soul, and 
grace to the neck, an ornament of grace, and a crown 
of glory to the head." The wisest and best advice 
therefore that can be given, is " Take fast hold of 
instruction, let her not go, keep her, for she is thy 
life." 

To be more particular. There are four conditions 
of life, in which nothing but the good morality of 
the Gospel can give us satisfaction. Consider prosperi- 
ty. May the God of providence make you all as pros- 
perous as you wish to be, as far as is consistent with his 
noble design in creating you ! May you thrive, and stic- 
ceed, and attain all your just wishes, and long may you 
live' ii> the enjoyment of them ! But what is prosperity 
without morality ? It is a most deplorable sight to see 
an immoral man prosper : not that we envy his pros- 
perity, but that it is shocking to see his wickedness in- 
crease as his reasons for being righteous multiply. Such 
a man only steps forward out of his cottage into a good 
house, to be pointed at as a wretch ungrateful to his 
Benefactor, unjust to his fellow-creatures, unmerciful to 
his family, and cruel to himself. The more he pros- 
pers, the more cups of deadly poison does he drink, and 
at length dies, in the opinion of all good men, " a ves- 
sel of wrath fitted to destruction." At his funeral no 



72 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK 



widow weeps, no orphan sheds a tear ; the poor hav« 
got rid of a tyrant, and the parish of a scourge, and his 
little history, told by many a tongue round many a fire, 
amounts to this ; " I have seen the wicked in great pow- 
er, and spreading himself like a green bay tree, yet he 
passed away, and lo, he was not. I have seen the fool- 
ish taking root; but suddenly I cursed his habitation. 
Even as I have seen, they that plough iniquity, and sow 
wickedness, reap the same." This is the certain con- 
dition of every wicked prosperous man : but it is not so 
with a good man, when he prospers. The language of 
his good heart is. What shall I do to glorify God ? How 
shall I best express my gratitude to my benefactor ? He 
goes with all advantages into his closet, consults the 
Prophets and Apostles, and asks each. What would you 
do in my condition ? He does more, he kneels before 
the throne of God, and saith, " Lord, what wilt thou 
have me to do V What wilt thou have me to do with 
my wealth ? What with my reputation and credit in 
the world ? How beautiful is such a man ! Remember it 
is not his prospesity, but the noble use he makes of it, 
that constitutes his beauty. It is that, which wins the 
hearts of all around him while he lives, and bedews his 
name with tears of affection as long after his death as 
his name is remembered. When we pray for your 
prosperity, then, we do so with this caution, that you 
may have grace to make a religious use of it : other- 
wise it would be equal to praying God to bestow on you 
a sword to stab yourself, and perhaps your wife, and 
your children, and your dearest friends. 

What can men do in adversity without morality ? Ad- 
versity alone is pitiable : adversity in company with 
virtue is respectable : but when adversity and wicked- 
ness unite, they make a man resemble a lion in chains, 
miserable himself, and a terror to others. A good man 
under afflictions retains the affections of his fellow Chris- 
tians, and excites the compassion of his fellow-creatures ; 
and on this account David said, " I have been young, 
and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous for- 
saken, nor his seed begging bre?.d." No, the righteous 
rich will relieve the righteous poor : the rich who have 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION. 13 

business will employ the good man's poor children, who 
have nothing to do. No, they shall not be forsaken, but 
found out and comforted: they shall not beg their bread, 
but their petitions shall be prevented. The church al- 
ways had, and always will have liberal men devising 
liberal things : not vile persons called liberal, nor churls 
said to be bountiful ; but men, who lilie their great Mas- 
ter, will be in their little sphere " an hiding-place from 
the wind, a covert from the tempest, as rivers of wa- 
ters in a dry place, as a shadow of a great rock in a 
weary land." Poor afflicted people, who are wicked, 
are miserable indeed, despised by others, and distressed 
in themselves ; in this world poverty and pain, in the 
, world to come punishment everlasting ; to use the lan- 
guage of a prophet, they are "destroyed with double 
destruction." # 

Consider yourselves in a state of guilt, arising from 
reflection, sharpened by the Scripture, and meeting you 
like a " flaming sword turning every way" when you 
would approach the throne of God. It is very true, that 
the relief of a sinner comes by believing the record 
which God hath given of his Son, by apprehending and 
laying hold of the mercy set before him in the Gospel ; 
but it is equally true that this faith cannot maintain its 
character, and prevent suspicion, unless it be accompa- 
nied with fruits. The heart doth not, cannot hope with- 
out holiness. Watch the frames of Christians, and you , 
will find doubts are nothing but effects, and every doubt 
hath a sin for its cause. Adam in innocence was free 
from suspicion ; it was after he had sinned that he said, 
" I heard thy voice and I was afraid, because I was na- 
ked, and I hid myself" Every attempt to procure 
peace of conscience without holiness is a mad and wick- 
ed project: mad, because it cannot succeed, and wicked, 
because it is in direct opposition to the law of nature, 
and the language of Scripture. Would you avoid the 
smart ? Avoid the wound. Would you enjoy peace ? 
Seek it in conformity to God, who is therefore a happy 
God, because he is a holy God. One of the greatest 
misfortunes, that can befall a man in this world, is to 
bring himself to be content and easy without religion ; 
7 



74 THE SCRIPTURE A GOOD BOOK, 

a fatal art, which some men have found out, and daily 
practise by strength of liquor, a round of company, a 
hurry of business, and so on. When Cain, the first mur- 
derer, was first called to account for his brother's blood, 
and told, " Thou art cursed from the earth, a fugitive 
and a vagabond shalt thou be," he said, " My punish- 
ment is greater than 1 can bear :" it should seem, his 
sense of guilt must shorten his life. No, he went out, 
took a wife, builded a city, called it after the name of 
his son, Enoch, and in these employments got rid of a 
horror which otherwise must have shortened his days. 
It is at the peril of bad men to be idle, it is the high 
road to melancholy or madness. There are, however, 
times in which guilt will rise like a ghost, and haunt 
every sinner ; and there is no real relief except in the 
path struck out in the Gospel. Though comfort may 
come slowly, it is sure to come that road according to 
the express appointment of the God of the spirits of all 
liesh, who hath said, '' Though the vision tarry, wait 
for it, because it will surely come, at the end it shall 
speak and not lie ;" it saith, '^ The just shall live by 
faith, but if any man draw back, my soul shall have no 
pleasure in him." 

Consider death. How different is the dying of a good 
man from the dying of the wicked ! The latter is 
against his will "driven away in his wickedness :" the 
former placid and happy, at peace with God and with 
all mankind, " hath hope in his death." What makes the 
difference ? It is not the room in which or the bed on 
which he dies. It is not the property he hath acquired, 
or the rank he hath occupied among his fellow-crea- 
tures. It is his character, his true and real character, 
his moral or immoral state, which now is just finished^ 
and therefore may now be judged. This makes all the 
difference, and it is impossible to make any thing sup- 
ply the place of goodness. Now the understanding re- 
covers its discernment of right and wrong : now the 
memory faithfully records the whole history of life : now 
the conscience rises from the meanness of a slave to the 
majesty of a judge : now the heart meditates terror, and 
jfeels the approach of an Almighty Judge : now the 



WRITTEN BY DIVINE INSPIRATION. 7ij 

whole world retires, and something within saith, " One 
thing thou lackest," while every thing without, saith, 
'' Behold, the Judge standeth before the door." A man 
must be wilfully blind, not to foresee this ; and desper- 
ately wicked, if he doth foresee it, not to provide for 
it, especially as the provision is set before him as a 
present from his God. One may very well say in this 
case what was said in another, '' My father, if the proph- 
et had bid thee do some great thing, wouldst thou not 
have done it ? Plow much rather then, when he saith 
to thee, Wash and be clean ?" 

Can any man say, I hope to prosper, I expect also to 
suffer, I sometimes blame my conduct, and have a sense 
of guilt, and as surely as I stand here to day, so surely 
must I die, and pass from death to judgment, and from 
thence to a state either happy or miserable forever : 
but I will venture all these, and run all hazards rather 
than receive the Gospel for a rule of my faith and prac- 
tice. It may be good for others for any thing I know : 
but it is not, it never can be good for me. I ask, can 
any man say this, and be reckoned a reasonable crea- 
ture ? Methinks I hear you say, God forbid we should 
" refuse him that speaketh ! for if they escape not who 
refused Moses that spake on earth, much more shall not 
we escape if we turn away from him that speaketh from 
heaven. Let us have grace whereby we may serve 
God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For 
our God is a consuming fire." May the Lord cherish 
these good resolutions in your hearts ! My prayer for 
you shall be, " Oh Lord God, who triest the heart and 
hast pleasure in uprightness, keep this for ever in the 
imagination of the thoughts of the heart of thy people, 
and prepare their hearts unto thee !" Amen, 



DISCOURSE V. 



JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSON MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 



[^r FULBOURKE.^ 

Before I read my text, give me leave, brethren, to 
open my heart to you. As I was coming hither this 
evening, and meditating on my text, I thought, Suppose, 
instead of going alone into the assembly this evening, as 
I shall, suppose it were possible for me to have the hon- 
our of leading by the hand through this numerous con- 
gregation up to the frame on which I shall stand, the 
Lord Jesus Christ in his own person, '' the first-born of 
every creature, the image of the invisible God." Sup- 
pose I should then open the twenty-second chapter of 
the Gospel according to Matthew, and with a clear, dis- 
tinct voice summon each of my hearers to give me an an- 
swer to the questions contained in the forty-second verse, 
which are these : 

What think ye of Christ ? Whose son is he 1 

Affection for you set me a thinking further on such 
answers as the most strict attention to truth would com- 
pel you to give. I thought. Suppose one should say, I 
never thought about Christ, and I never intend to think 
about him ; suppose a second should say, I have thought 
of him, and I despise him, because he is not " a minister 
of sin ;" and suppose a third should say, I hate him, 
and, as it is not in my power to persecute him, I express 
my hatred of him by ridiculing and tormenting all who 
respect and resemble him. My brethren, it is not for 



JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSON &C. Tl 

me to pretend to know yonr hearts, or to pronounce any 
thing certain ; but the bare apprehension of such dispo- 
sitions excited in me, as it must in every one who loves 
his neighbour as himself, a thousand suspicions and 
fears. 

Dreading such answers as these, I thought again, 
What if I should bend my knee to the insulted friend of 
sinners, and humbly ask, O Son of David ! what think 
you of these people ? Whose children are they ? Alas ! 
I thought I saw him looking round about on you with 
anger, being grieved for the hardness of your hearts ; 
then turning about, melting with compassion, going down 
the steps, walking slowly out of the assembly, and all 
the way weeping, and saying, " O that thou hadst 
known, even thou, the most inveterate of the congrega- 
tion, at least in this thy day, the things which belong* 
unto thy peace ; but 7iow^ but now they are hid from 
thine eyes." 

Alas ! thought I, suppose thi« inveterate enemy of 
Christ should recover his reason after he is in bed to- 
night, what sort of a night's rest would he have ? Ah ! 
miserable man ! I see you start out of your sleep, as if a 
thunderclap woke you, with the last words of Jesus 
sounding in your ears, " But now they are hid from thine 
eyes !" and " This night thy soul shall be required of 
thee." Alas ! disobedient Jonah ! where are you now ? 
" Waves and billows pass over you, and the earth with 
her bars is about you forever." Is this unjust ? Why 
should you have any more opportunities of rejecting 
mercy, and insulting your only friend ? What hath all, 
your life been but ruin to yourself, and a cruel snare to 
others ? No, you " would none of my counsel, and de- 
spised all my reproof;" now, you may " call, but I vv^ill 
not answer ;" you may " seek me, but you shall not find 
me ; yea I will laugh at your calamity, and mock when 
the whirlwind of distress and anguish cometh upon 
you." 

Jesus Christ could have done all this, this day month, 

when you set at nought all his counsel before, for all 

power is given unto him in heaven and in earth ; but 

see what a merciful use he m^kes of his dominion ov^r 

• 7* 



TB JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSON 

you ! He pities your condition, loves you better than 
you love yourself, and proposes the questions in the 
text, with a design to prepare you to meet his messen- 
jrer, Death, '' the king of terrors." 

Christians, hear this, and know it for your good. 
*' The king of terrors," Death, large as the space which 
he occupies in Scripture is, Death is not the principal 
king mentioned in Scripture ; there is a king mightier 
than he, a " King of kings, and Lord of lords," who 
•' must reign till he hath put all enemies under his feet," 
the last enemy, death, not excepted, and so bring to 
pass the saying of a prophet, " Death is swallowed up in 
victory." This is the delightful subject which I am 
going this evening to teach, for to this end come proper 
answers to the questions proposed by our Saviour in the 
text, '' What think ye of Christ? Whose son is he?" 

You know, we hold it a just and sacred law of preach- 
ing from Scripture, from which we never allow ourselves 
on any consideration to depart, to give the literal and 
true sense of tlie writer, and never to warp the word of 
God from its own meaning. However, when the sense 
and scope of a passage is easy, and not perplexed by 
popular errors, we do not think it always necessary to 
speak of the context, that is, the words before and after 
a text. Sometimes we take the general truth, on which 
a particular text is founded, and at other times one out 
of many truths contained in it, and provided we establish 
the literal and true sense of Scripture, nothing of this 
kind is improper, and the public edification must be our 
guide. The text before us is a particular question 
leading to a general truth ; for by inquiring what family 
Christ was of, we shall find he was a descendant of 
David, and that his ancestor David, though himself a 
king, and an inspired prophet, thought his son Christ 
a greater person than himself, and " called him Lord." If 
we pursue the subject further, and examine the reasons 
Vs'hich induced David to give him the preference, we 
shall be convinced that the same reasons, which prove 
him a person of more dignity and worth than David, 
prove him also superior to all the first characters among 
mankind. This was the declaration of an apostle, " The 



MENTIOI^D IN SCRIPTURE. 79 

Son of the love of God is the image of the invisible God, 
the first-born of every creature," who ranks before all 
persons, and in all things must have the pre-eminence. 

Justice to Scripture, however, requires us to detain 
you a moment on the particular sense of the text. You 
know those Jews who are called Pharisees in the verse 
before the text. Every body knows, and every body 
abhors these hypocrites, whose ignorance and hypocrisy 
were always in opposition to the wisdom and sincerity 
of Jesus Christ. Who can help detesting a false and 
hungry hireling, who makes a long prayer, uttered with 
a sad face in long robes, '' a pretence for devouring 
widows' houses ?" Jesus Christ wept over other sinners, 
but he denounced judgments against these, because though 
they were wilfully ignorant, yet they pretended to teach, 
and though they were extremely wicked, yet they set 
themselves up for examples of piety to others. " Wo 
unto you, blind guides ! How can ye escape the, damna- 
tion of hell ?" It was to a company of these men that 
Jesus Christ addressed the text, " What think ye of 
Christ ? Whose son is he ?" Their prophets had taught 
them to expect a Christ, that is, one appointed of God 
to officiate among them in his stead, to administer jus- 
tice, to bestow mercy, and to make them great, and 
good, and happy. They had even named the tribe and 
family of which he should be born, and for this purpose 
had preserved histories of the succession of families, 
which histories are called in Scripture genealogies. 
The Jews had always been very careful of these histo- 
ries, for all Israel were reckoned by genealogies, and 
those of the reigning family were kept by prophets and 
seers. You have one of these in the first of Matthew, 
and another in the third of Luke. It was extremely 
proper in our Saviour to put this question, " Whose son 
is Christ ?" to his company, both as Jews who understood 
genealogies, and as Pharisees who pretended to more 
understanding than other men, and who were also keep- 
ers of those useful records, so proper to make out a title, 
or to detect an impostor. There, in a list of men, be- 
ginning with Adam and ending with himself, stood " the 
name of Jesus, the name above every name, at which 



$0 JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSON ^ 

every knee should bow." " Call his name Jesus," said 
an angel from heaven, " for he shall save his people 
from their sins." 

To be first in some catalogues is a disgrace ; to be 
first in some others is no honour ; but to be the chief 
where all are excellent is a high degree of merit. 
What a dreadful thing it is for a man to be chief in the 
profession and practice of any sin ; how shameful to be 
the chief of drunkards, the chief swearer, the chief liar 
in a parish ! A sort of schoolmaster of vice, to ruin all 
the young people in a parish by teaching them the max- 
ims of a drinking-house, and by showing them how to 
put the rules in practice. Brutal pride ! Infernal ambi- 
tion ! The pride of " Beelzebub the chief of devils !" 
Even where it is no shame to be chief, yet it may be no 
honour. It is a very silly vanity that bewitches some 
men ; they must be first, first of any thing, but they must 
be first ! Would to God, my brethren, we had a sound 
understanding to direct our ambition ! The ambition of 
a man directed by the understanding of a child, always 
forms a very ridiculous character, and makes the man of 
six foot high, at forty years of age, glory in being the 
mighty monarch of sixteen little boys at school. 

A sound understanding would direct us to excel, and 
to know, allow, and admire the excellencies of others. 
It was the wish of the apostle Paul, that Christians of 
his time might not come behind in any gift. He \yished 
they might excel in such honest trades as they professed, 
for so we are to understand the fourteenth verse of the 
last chapter of Titus. To be the chief singer in a 
christian society, to be the chief speaker, to sit chief 
among our neighbours in wisdom, integrity, courage, and 
tenderness of heart for the afflicted, are honours to 
which you should all aspire. To this thousands have 
aspired, and if Jesus Christ occup}' the first seat among 
the excellent of the earth, it is because that seat is due 
to his merit. " He, being in the form of God, thought it 
not robbery to be equal with God ; but made himself of 
no reputation, and took upon him the form of a servant, 
and was made in the likeness of men ; and being found 
in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became 



MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 81 

obedient unto death, even the death of the cross. Where- 
fore God also hath highly exalted him, and given him a 
name above every name ; that at the name of Jesus ev* 
ery knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in 
earth ; and that every tongue should confess that Jesus 
Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father." 

Would you know what the writers of Scripture " think 
of Christ, whose son he is ?" They all wait to answer 
your reasonable inquiry. They describe him as chief 
in dignity of nature . . . first among the prophets . . . 
principal in sacred history . . . higher in power, per- 
fection, and honour, than the highest of mankind ; 
" fairer than the children of men, the head of all princi- 
pality and power." 

When we speak of the nature of Jesus Christ, and as- 
cribe dignity to it, we do not mean to intrude into those 
things which we have not seen, vainly puffed up by a 
fleshly mind. The Scripture is not a book of philoso- 
phy, intended to instruct us in the specific nature, con- 
struction, and properties of persons and things. The 
doctrines of the Gospel are reports to be believed on the 
credit of the speaker ; and in all cases where the report 
includes any thing beyond our comprehension, it is our 
wisdom to be modest in regard to that particular article; 
The Scripture calls Jesus Christ God and man, and we 
believe him to be God and man in one person. " The 
word, which was made flesh and dwelt among us, was 
with God, and was God. Had more been necessary, 
more would have been added. This is enough to justify 
all the homage, which men and angels pay to Jesus 
Christ ; for to which of the angels said God at any time 
what our Lord told the Pharisees, a little after our text, 
God had said to him, " Sit thou on my right hand,'iill I 
make thine enemies thy footstool." To angels he saith, 
" Let all the angels of God worship him ; but unto the 
Son he saith. Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever, a 
sceptre of righteousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom." 
On this account '' Davij^ in spirit called his Son Lord ;" 
and, on this account, " the redeemed of every kindred, 
and tongue, and people, and nation, with ten thousand 
times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands of angels, 



12 JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSO.V 

and eTery creature, which is in heaven, and on the 
earth, and under the earth, and in the sea, say with a loud 
voice. Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive 
power and riches, wisdom and strength, and honour and 
blessing : glory be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, 
and to the Lamb forever and ever." This is the per- 
son, who asks you in the text, ''What think ye of Christ?" 
The proper answer is, we form no rash conjectures con- 
cerning questions of the schools, which perhaps we have 
no capacity, and certainly no information from Scrip- 
ture to enable us to determine ; but we think, agreea- 
bly to the declarations of him who thoroughly knew the 
nature of Jesus Christ, that he is " Lord of all, far above 
all principality and power, and might and dominion, and 
every name that is named, not only in this world, but 
also in that which is to come." We think " that all 
men should honour the Son, even as they honour the 
Father." 

When I am given to understand that this eminent per- 
son, who was in " glory with the Father before the world 
was," intended to quit " the bosom of the Father," to 
honour this world with a visit, and to execute a public 
office in it, I cast about in my mind to find out what 
charge is proper to employ a mind so exalted. Where 
will he reside, or what will he do? Will he dwell in 
the country, and instruct mankind in the art of husband- 
ry ? Will he honour artists and manufacturers with his 
advice and improvements ? Will he teach the sailor 
how to pass and re-pass with safety the boisterous Avaves 
of the sea ? Will he head an army, and perfect man- . 
kind in the dreadful art of slaughter ? Will he improve 
commerce, or will he exemplify in his ov/n person the 
character of a king? Childish as all this may appear, 
this was the employment which the sensual Jews ex- 
pected their Christ to perform, and such performances 
would have gratified their senseless love of dominion 
and wealth. Jesus Christ had nobler views, and better 
works than these to perform in this world. His wise 
mind penetrated into the nature and duration of man, 
and his generous heart undertook an office, which was 
to end in the highest glory to God, and the best estab- 



MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 63 

lished peace among men. He was to rise like the 
" sun Avith healing in his wings," lest the just judgments 
of God should come and smite the earth, all stained with 
crimes and human blood, with a curse. 

To this most important service the love of God ap- 
pointed this Son of David ; and as men were set apart to 
officiate among the Jews by the ceremony of anointing 
with oil, God was pleased to describe Jesus by the name 
of Christ, or Messiah, that is the anointed, the person 
set apart and appointed to be the Saviour of the world. 
So the Samaritans, under the instruction of Jesus, un- 
derstood the word. He said to the woman of Samaria, 
" I am the Messias," and the Samaritans " said unto the 
same woman, now we believe, not because of thy say- 
ing, for we have heard him ourselves, and know that 
this is indeed the Christ, the Saviour of the world." To 
save the world was a fine thought, and will always do 
its author honour : but, my God ! what an undertaking ! 
An undertaking, however, to which Jesus Christ was 
every way equal. It was no rash enterprize, taken up 
without much thought, and ending in the disgrace of the 
manager. Cool, mature deliberation, a prudent com- 
parison of difficulties with abilities to surmount them, 
patience to endure much contradiction, compassion to 
pity and goodness to pardon the most cruel affi'onts, jus- 
tice to claim and dignity to support rights and privi- 
leges due to the office, perfect purity towards God, and 
general good will towards all mankind, these, and whatev- 
er else were necessary to the execution of this grand de- 
sign, were all found in the Son of David. " What think 
ye of Christ ? Whose son is he ?" The proper answer 
is, He is the Christ, exclusive of every other, " the son 
of the living God, full of grace and truth." 

The world had lost its understanding, and lost it so 
completely as not to know its Creator. The salvation 
of the world from such gross ignorance, therefore, re- 
quired the revelation of a body of sound religious infor- 
mation, and this the prophets gave. Jesus Christ was 
the chief subject of prophecy, and himself the greatest 
of all prophets. A prophet is one who foretells future 
events, and various are the events both of nations and 



84 JESUS CHRIST THE PRIXCIPAL PERSON 

individuals foretold by the Jewish prophets : but there 
is one person, of whom " all the prophets witness," that 
is Jesus Christ, and of him they speak in raptures, at- 
tributing to him the most noble of all qualities, the most 
difficulties and the greatest success and honour. Time 
would fail me, should I tell of all the prophecies con- 
cerning Christ uttered by these inspired men. In gen- 
eral, we may observe, that the path of these exact men 
was " as the shining light, that shineth more and more 
unto the perfect day." Christ was in the prophecies 
like one sun in the world ; and every age, like every 
hour, brought new light, till he made his personal ap- 
pearance ; and then he as far outshone all description, 
as the sun outgoes in a morning, when it rises to sight, 
all the images that twilight teaches us to form of it. 
From Adam to Noah mankind were taught, that '• the 
seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head." 
From Noah to Abraham they understood, that God would 
dwell in the person of his Son " in the tents of Shem." 
From Abraham to Jacob they believed that in a son of 
this patriarch " all the families of the earth should be 
blessed." Many years after, when Jacob was dying, 
the spirit of prophecy informed them that the people 
should be gathered unto a descendant of Judah, and that 
he should make his appearance in the world before that 
tribe should cease to be a distinct tribe of itself When 
Moses was about to quit the world, he informed the 
Jews that the promised Christ would be a " prophet 
like unto himself," perhaps like him in person, but cer- 
tainly like him endowed with singular powers to dis- 
charge the high trust of delivering mankind from sla- 
very, and teaching them a perfect religion. In process 
of time more particulars were added concerning the per- 
son, the work, the place, the time, the treatment, the 
life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ ; 
and so well was this understood, that the chief priests 
and scribes, even they at Herod's court, the most igno- 
rant and wicked of all, could tell that tyrant the village 
where Christ should be born. When there is but one 
person of a kind, and he of the utmost importance to 
the world, it is absolutely necessary to be punctual in 



MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 85 

describing him, that if God intends a blessing to mankind 
they may know where to find it. Such punctuality the 
prophets use concerning Christ, and I would desire no 
plainer direction to find the best beloved friend in the 
world. " What think ye of Christ ? Whose son is he ?'• 
The proper answer is, The Son of God, the son of Adam, 
the son of Noah, the son of Abraham, the son of Jacob, 
..the son of Judah, the son of David, the son of a virgin, 
born at Bethlehem in the days of Herod the king, and 
named Emanuel, that is, God with us. Thus " we have 
found the Messias, which is, being interpreted, the 
Christ, of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets did 
write, Jesus of Nazareth." 

Jesus of Nazareth perfectly understood all the Scrip- 
ture, how it was written, and how it " behoved Christ 
to suifer, and to enter into his glory." When he read 
the Scriptures in the synagogues, as his custom was, 
and found the place in Isaiah " where it was written, 
The spirit of the Lord hath anointed me to preach the 
Gospel," he said, '' This day is this Scripture fulfilled 
in your ears." When he conversed with his disciples, 
he said, " Think not that I am come to destroy the 
prophets ; I am not come to destroy but to fulfil. Veriiy, 
I say unto you, many prophets have desired to see those 
things which ye see, and have not seen them, and to 
hear those things which ye hear, and have not heard 
them." After his resurrection, he gave two of his dis- 
ciples the very idea we are now trjing to give you ; 
for " beginning at Moses, and all the prophets," he 
omitted the fate of kings and kingdoms, and " expound- 
ed unto them in all the Scriptures the things concerning 
himself" What think ye of Christ as an expositor of 
Scripture ? His two hearers " said one to another, Did 
not our hearts burn within us," did we not feel the fire 
that animated the prophets, did we not enter into both 
their sentiments and emotions, " while he talked with 
us by the way, and while he opened to us the Scrip- 
tures ?" 

Himself was the greatest of all prophets. He not on- 
ly foretold the actions and sufferings of his apostles, but 
-the fate of all Christians to the end of tirae. He not 



86 JESTJS CHRIST THE PRIIfCIPAL FERSO]^ 

only foretold the destruction of his country, but that ot' 
the whole world, laying open the rising of the dead, 
the last judgment, the joy of heaven, and the horror of 
hell. He was not only a prophet himself, but he com- 
municated a spirit of prophecy to his Apostles, and 
taught them to speak " all mysteries, and all knowledge, 
with the tongues of men and of angels," and, what was 
more, he communicated to them a charity that will nev- 
er fail, though prophecies, and tongues, and knowledge, 
shall all fail and vanish away. " He set in the church 
apostles, prophets, teachers, miracles, gifts of healings, 
helps, governments, diversities of tongues," and all to 
show unto us, blind gentiles, the more excellent way of 
love to God and all mankind. And now, my brethren, what 
ought we, forlorn gentiles, to think of Jesus Christ? 
Shall we, too, " crucify the Lord of glory ?" shall we, by 
imitating the wicked Jews in their vices, call him, " the 
master of the house, Beelzebub ?" Merciful God ! To 
what a degree of wickedness must a man go, before he 
can bring himself to utter such a cruel outrage ! 

The history of the Jews is a history of guilt, and the 
Saviour, who undertakes to redeem them, must exem- 
plify a new history, the history of one, who could so re- 
move guilt as to render the guilty proper objects of 
mercy. The Redeemer did this. He wept, he prayed, 
he died to effect this, and his history is at once the scan- 
dal and glory of his country. The history of the Jews 
sets before us many eminent characters, and no nation 
but they can show such men as Abraham, Moses, Dan- 
iel, and John .the Baptist ; but take away the life of 
Christ from the history of the Jews, and you strip it of 
its chief ornament. Jesus of Nazareth was the most 
considerable person of that nation, and he is emphati- 
cally styled, not only " the desire of all nations," that is, 
such a person as all nations looked for among themselves 
in vain, but " the glory of the people of Israel :" the 
glory of that people, who of all the world had produced 
the most exalted characters. In this view the Jews are 
objects of envy, and when all the world was sunk into 
idolatry, " God was known in Judah, and his name was 
great in Israel :" but never was God so well known in 



MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 87 

Judah as in the days of Jesus Christ. To consider the 
Jews, as they appear in the history of this ornament of 
their country, they become objects of pity, and seem the 
most execrable of all nations in the world ; and the cru- 
cifixion of Christ hath made a blot in their history, 
which time can never wipe out. Jesus knew all this ; 
he knew Herod was a crafty fox, the scribes and phari- 
sees, and principal churchmen, ignorant hypocrites, dan- 
gerous to society as whited sepulchres to unwary trav- 
ellers ; he knew the common people had given up their 
understandings, and consciences, and feelings to their 
blind guides ; he knew they all despised his ministry, 
slandered his character, derided his warnings, attributed 
his miracles to the devil, and thirsted for his blood ; he 
knew, for he felt, they set him at nought, insulted his 
suiFerings, made game of his person, and numbered him 
with transgressors ; nailed him to a cross, and not satis- 
fied with all the cruelties they exercised upon him, 
glutted their rage also on all his family, friends, and fol- 
lowers. Brethren, " What think ye of Christ? Whose 
son is he ?" Is he a descendant of the favourite king 
David, and is it possible a people should be so ungrate- 
ful to a family, that deserved so well of their country ? 
Barbarous Jews ! What blame, what enormous guilt 
does your conduct bring upon yourselves ? The histo- 
ry of Christ is the scandal of your records. 

Amidst all this treatment, you see nothing in Jesus 
but a firm perseverance in doing good, a mind uninter- 
rupted in its deliberations, a heart unruffled with pas- 
sion, a conduct inoffensive to all, a doctrine serene. and 
placid, and a life all filled up with good and useful ac- 
tions ; where ordinary means were not sufficient fully to 
answer the just wishes of all about him, he was ready to 
exercise extraordinary powers, to feed the hungry, to. 
^leal their sick, and to raise their dead. Sometimes he 
wept over his country ; often, very often he taught in 
all their cities and villages, and when he was dying, he 
prayed God to forgive them. After his resurrection, he 
did some of their nation the honour of appointing them 
to teach all other nations ; perfectly free from all re- 
eentmejQt, he directed them to begin to preach repent' 



SfS* JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL P^RSOST 

ance and remission of sins at Jerusalem; forty days af- 
ter he poured out his spirit upon them, and added unto 
his followers "three thousand souls" of this untoward 
generation ; a few days after he made the number "five 
thousand ;" and, that nothing might be wanting to dis- 
play the abundance of his mercy, he made " a great 
company of the priests," his old inveterate foes, "obe- 
dient to the faith." Long after this, he inspired an 
apostle to say to them, " I could wish that myself were 
accursed from Christ, for my brethren, my kinsmen ac- 
cording to the flesh ; my heart's desire and prayer to 
God for Israel is, that they might be saved :" he left it 
upon record for all succeeding Jews, that they also, " if 
they abode not still in unbelief, should be grafted into 
the church," and that, after all the punishments that 
should befall them, and all the crimes they should com- 
mit, they should " be saved, when the fulness of th€i' 
Gentiles came in." " What think ye of Christ ?" Did^ 
^ver, could ever any other person of his owrt, or of any' 
other country show such a history of unwearied good- 
ness as he ? " Whose son is he ?" Of what father is 
he the "express image ?" 

Greatly as this history is to the honour of Jesus 
Christ, all this is little in comparison with the rest. Je- 
sus sent his apostles " into all the world, to preach the 
gospel to every creature," and they were empowered as 
well as commissioned to go into the " uttermost parts of 
the earth," to bring " all nations under obedience to th« 
faith," yea to " bring into captivity every thought to 
the obedience of Christ." , The history of Christ is con- 
nected with that of all nations that have received his 
Gospel, and it is the history of the best benefactor of 
every kingdom ; for the Gospel is a greater blessing to 
any country than trade and wealth, and even civil gov- 
ernment itself A pardon for all the sins of Jews and 
Romans, English, French, and all other nations; a par- 
don for sins of ignorance, and sins against light and 
knowledge ; a pardon coming to us through the bloody 
death of this illustrious Jew ; benefits in consequence 
flowing down from father to son, from family to family, 
magnifying and multiplying for " a thousand gen^j;^ 



MENTIONED tN SCRIPTURE. 89 

iions" in this life, and after this life in a future state : 
what a history, what an astonishing historj^ is this ^ 
'<- What think ye of Christ?" What think you of a mind 
that could plan, a power that could execute, and a heart 
that could bestow such a present as this ? " Who hath 
ascended up into heaven? Who hath established all 
the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is 
his Son's name ; canst thou tell ?" 

It was prophesied of Christ, that " a seed should serve 
him," which should '' be accounted to the Lord for a 
generation ;" that " his kingdom should be exalted high- 
er than that of Agag ;" that he should be '• higher than 
the kings of the earth ;" that "• all kings should serve 
him, and all nations call him blessed, as long as the sun 
and the moon endure." As a proper foundation for all 
this power and honour, an absolute perfection is ascribed 
to him, and the homage paid to him is both for his own 
personal excellence, and for the benefits which we de- 
rive from it. Do all nations call him blessed ? It is 
because " in his days the righteous flourish in abun- 
dance of peace ;" because " he redeems the souls of the 
poor and needy from deceit and violence ;" and esteems 
their ''blood precious in his sight." 

The perfection, which we ascribe to Jesus Christ, is 
not like that which is attributed to men or angels ; 
but is to be understood both absolutely and relatively. 
1 will explain myself. Jesus was absolutely perfect and 
complete in all the senses of his body and in all the fa- 
culties of his mind, so that without any relation to us he 
would have been the most complete person in the uni- 
verse : this I call absolute perfection. This perfect 
person, by undertaking a public trust, and by execut- 
ing the office of a Mediator between God and men, be- 
came related to mankind, and to all the events that hap- 
pen in this world ; and by relative perfection, I mean all 
the powers, privileges, and qualities necessary to the 
rfegulation of all affairs in discharge of the high trus-t 
committed to him by the Father. " What think ye of 
Christ ?" Is any other person possessed of such a per^ 
feet '» spirit of wisdom and understanding," such a " spirit 
of counsel and mischt," such a " spirit of knowledge ajid of 
8* 



l90 JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSON 

the fear of the Lord ?" Can any compare with him for 
"judging with righteousness, arguing with equity, and 
slaying the wicked with the breath of his lips ?" " Whose 
«on is he," that tames the tempers of wolves, lions, and 
leopards, so that lambs and kids may lie down with 
them, and a " little child lead them?" These are the 
perfections of " a branch out of the stem of Jesse," a 
son of the decayed family of David, a root out of that 
dry ground, Judea. 

And now, my brethren, what honour shall be confer- 
red on this son of David ? God, the just rewarder of 
merit, hath conferred the highest honours upon him. 
A long train of prophets came first in the procession of 
our King, and foretold his approach. The ceremonies 
of the Jewish religion were drafts and pattern of him. 
At his coming, a new star appeared to wise men, angels 
came down to join with shepherds in singing his praise ; 
his mother and his family, and even the hoary Simeon 
and Anna, were inspired to compose hymns^in his praise. 
During his life, the whole world felt his presence, winds 
and waves, the stubborn ass, the wary fish, the diseases 
and vices of men obeyed his word, and Death yielded up 
his prey. When he quitted the world an eclipse, an 
earthquake, and a resurrection of the dead published the 
news. Him God raised from the dead, and him he 
shewed openly, having spoiled principalities and pow- 
ers, and publicly triumphing over them. Now that 
he is ascended to heaven, and set down at the right 
hand of God, he receives all possible honour, and Aviil 
come again to raise the dead, to judge the world in the 
glory of his Father and of his holy angels. "■ What think 
ye of Christ?" Doth he not deserve all these honours? 
Was ever power more nobly employed than in raising 
him to all this dignit}^, a dignity never abused by him, 
never perverted to an unjust or an unkind purpose, but 
always employed for the benefit of the wretched ? " What 
think ye of Christ ?" Do you consent to his ascending 
the throne, and being " crowned with glory and hon- 
our ?" The day is fixed for his coronation, and then 
on his head will be many croWns. Even the most glo- 
rious creatures, who have deserved best of their fellow- 



MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 91 

creatures, will " cast their crowns before his throne, 
saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to receive glory and 
honour!" There will be no apostle weeping, because 
no man of merit can be found, but all will exclaim, '' Be- 
hold the man ! Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh 
away the sin of the world ! Lo, this is our God, we 
have waited for him !" 

For my part, when I consider the little projects of the 
proudest of mankind, and the tawdry pomp of the most 
elevated mortal, I see nothing but a tiny scheme of 
glossy wretchedness ; and when I compare this with the 
wisdom and power of God manifested in Christ at the 
last day, I pity and weep over the folly of my little fel- 
low-creatures. Poor Haman ! Is this honour, to ride on 
the horse of a king in roj'al apparel through the streets 
of a little city. Simple Ahasuerus ! What are ^' white, 
and green, and blue hangings," what are " silver rings, 
and pillars of marble ;" what are " beds of gold and sil- 
ver ;" what are " pavements of red and black" polish ; 
what are your " hundred and twenty-seven provinces," 
and your " feasts of a hundred and four-score days," 
compared with the everlasting happiness of the court of 
the Son of David ! With what unspeakable pleasure 
will Christ surve}^ the innumerable multitude, which he 
shall have plucked from the jaws of destruction ! With 
what eyes will all his followers behold such a benefac- 
tor! How sincerely will many a soul exclaim, " I had 
not thought to see thy face ; and lo, God hath shewed 
me thy family also." Then should any disciple of Christ 
summon the company to answer the questions in the 
text, ''What think ye of Christ ? Whose son is he ?" 
then you would hear an answer in " unspeakable words, 
which it is not possible for a man in this life to utter." 

Brethren, send me away to-night vith a blessing. Let 
me return with that high rev/ard of my labour, the joy 
of hoping that I have not been speaking to the deaf and 
the dead. There is a set of men, w^ho " are like the 
deaf adder that stoppeth her ear," and would " not 
hearken lo the voice of charmers, charming ever so 
wisely." Such as the}^, are of no party ; they hate the 
very forms of religion, and would not give even aa 



92 JESUS CHRIST THE 1»RINCIPAL PERSON 

apostle a hearing. You are not of this sort, you are 
willing to hear even me lisp on the subject of religion. 
I love you, it is all the qualification I have to preach to 
you : but this love, like that of the mother for her child, 
wakes my grief, and rouses up ten thousand fears. I 
fear, you should not be found when '' the Lord shall 
count, and write up his people." 1 can with pleasure 
" make mention of Rahab and Babylon ;" I can say with 
a heart full of satisfaction, " Behold, this and that man 
was born in Zion ;" but you, what can I say of you ? 
Alas! ''Joseph is not, and Simeon is not; all these 
things are against me." 

True, you are not of those serpents that refuse to 
hear ; but yet " the poison of adders is under your lips," 
and " with your' tongues you use deceit." True, your 
mouth is not " full of cursing and bitterness ;" but yet 
" there is no fear of God before 3'our eyes." Your feet 
are not swift to shed blood ;" but yet '' destruction and 
misery are in your idle ways." Your "• throat is not an 
open sepulchre ;" but yet you are " gone out of the 
v.ay, and become unprofitible." Let us put the matter 
to proof. '' What think ye of Christ ?" What do you 
think of the doctrine he taught? Have you examined, 
;md do you believe it ? What do you think of the blood 
he shed? Have you examined sin, your own sin, which 
caused the shedding of that precious blood ? What 
think you of the laws he gave his disciples to " love their 
enemies," to "shine as lights in the world," to "pluck 
out a right eye," to be " perfect as their Father which 
is in heaven is perfect ?" Do you approve of these 
laws, and make them the standing rules of your actions ? 
What think you of the Jews insulting Christ? Are you 
a Jew, do you justify them by imitating their exam- 
ple ? What think ;, ou of the honour done to Christ by 
his Father, and by all good men ? Are you an enemy 
to good men of every nation, and to a good God, who 
giveth you " life, and breath, and all things ?" Search 
and see. Recollect, there is a glory of Christ, which 
1 liave not yet mentioned, that is, the glory of his justice 
in punishing the wicked at the last day. For the pre- 
sent you may goon; you need not take thought, say- 



MENTIONED IN SCRIPTURE. 93' 

ing, What ought I to think of Christ : you may lay* 
this aside, and spend all your life in putting and an- 
swering other questions, as, " What shall I eat ? What 
shall I drink ? or wherewithal shaU I be clothed V and 
you need not blush for being singular, for " after all 
these things did the Gentiles seek," who like you were 
*' without Christ, having no hope, and being without 
God in the world :" but, recollect, after you have set all 
these things in your hearts instead of God, the slighted 
Saviour will " come with clouds, and every eye shall 
see him ;" the Jews "• who pierced him, and all kindreds 
of the earth," who rejected him, shall "wail because of 
him." And in that sad day, w^ien trouble and anguish 
shall come upon you, what will all the friends of Christ 
say of your case ? They wall say, " Even so. Amen !" 
Miserable man ! See the " great white throne and him 
tliat sits on it, from whose face the earth and the hea- 
ven flee away." See " thei dead, small and great, stand 
before God, the books opened,' and the dead judged ac- 
cording to their works." Behold " the sea giving up 
the dead which were in it, and death and hell delivering 
up the dead which were in them." See, " whosoever 
is not found written in the book of life, is cast into the 
lake of fire, cast alive into a lake of fire burning with 
brimstone." I do not ask what the condemned will 
think of Christ then, for love of self will triumph over 
love of justice; but I ask the "people in heaven," and 
they reply, "True and, righteous are his judgments." 
Now I ask you, what think you of that Christ, who is 
both able and willing to deliver you from all this pun- 
ishment, and from all fear of suffering it? O sweet and 
comfortable declaration ! " This man, because he con- 
tinueth ever, is able to save them to the uttermost, that 
come unto God by him, seeing he ever liveth to make 
intercession for them !" How well doth " such an high 
priest become us !" How much doth he deserve the 
first and finest emotions of my soul ! Not " think of 
Christ 1" That would be wretchedness complete ! What 
have I to think of beside ? Pain in my body, guilt in 
my mind, the malice of my enemies, the treachery of 
my friends, disappointment of my hopes, vanity and vex- 



94 JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPAL PERSON &C. 

ation of business, old age and sickness, death, the grare, 
and the fear of the " damnation of hell," these are black 
and gloomy things, and a perpetual attention to these, 
through all which I have to travel in the night without 
a guide, would drive me to distraction. Monster that I 
should be, if I could find in my heart to reject Jesu« 
Christ as my guide ! Not think of him ! I will think 
of nothing else ; he shall be to me instead of every oth- 
er subject, the food and fire of my soul. If I pray, he 
will become my advocate too. If I repent, he will for- 
give me. When I wander, he will restore me. When 
I tremble at the dreary path through " the valley of the 
shadow of death," he will say to me, " Fear not, thou 
worm Jacob, for I am with thee ; when thou passest 
through the waters, I will be with thee, and through the 
rivers, they shall not overflow thee ; when thou walk- 
est through the fire thou shalt not be burnt; neither 
shall the flame kindle upon thee." Not think of Christ ! 
" If I forget thee," O Saviour of my soul ! " let my 
right hand forget her cunning ! If I do not remember 
thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth !'^ 
May God inspire us all with such sentiments ! To him 
be honour and glory for ever. Amen. 



DISCOURSE VI. 

THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST DISTINGUISHES HIM FROJf ALL 
OTHER PERSONS. 

l^^T ICKLETOJy] 



MARK vii. 24. 

And Jesus entered into an house^ and would have no man 
know it : but he could not be hid. 

There are two sorts of persons who cannot be hid ; 
the first are men of remarkable qualities, and the other 
are men in public offices. It is impossible to both these 
classes to escape the public eye, and, whoever enjoys 
the pleasure of privacy, they must not expect it. It is 
a wise management of Providence, a perpetual restraint 
upon sin, and a constant motive to virtue. 

Men of remarkable qualities of vice are necessarily 
exposed to contempt, and the higher the rank, the more 
horrible their crimes appear. Belshazzar was a king 
of this sort, Caiaphas was a priest, Pilate a judge, and 
Judas a friend of this class, whose unworthy names are 
so well known as to stand for the foul arid filthy crimes, 
for which they rendered themselves remarkable. Such 
may well desire to retreat from the eyes of men, and, if 
it were possible, from the censure of Almighty God. 
Thus the prophet Micaiah reproached Zedekiah, a false, 
and cruel prophet of Ahab, '' Behold, thou shalt go from 
chamber to chamber to hide thyself" Thus also, the 
apostle John represents the wicked at the last day a« 
'' saying to mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide 



S6 THE MERIT OF JEStJS CHRIST 

US from the face of him that sitteth on the throne." I 
call this shame a restraint upon vice ; and low as this 
passion is, even this shadow of virtue is necessary to the 
good of society ; for the monstrous crimes now commit- 
ted hy great men are nothing to what they have an in- 
clination to commit, durst they, when they had done, 
look either God or man in the face. No, singular abil- 
ities for the commission of sin cannot be exercised in 
secret, the owners of them want room ; they are not, 
like some little insects, hardly known to be in the world ; 
but they resemble the " lion coming up from his thick- 
et," his " voice publishing affliction," and his fellow- 
creatures crying, " Destruction upon destruction, woe 
unto us, for we are spoiled." Happy for us, mighty 
powers for mischief can neither be concealed nor ap- 
proved ! 

Men of remarkable good qualities of either body or 
mind cannot be hid. " Saul was the desire of all Israel, 
for he was a choice young man, and there was not a 
goodlier person than he ; from his shoulders and upward 
he was higher than any of the people." His size show- 
ed itself It is the same with remarkable genius, and 
endowments of mind ; for skill will break out, and show 
itself; it " cannot be hid." It was the art of David in 
" playing on an harp," that first recommended him to 
king Saul ; and it was the singular sweetness of his man- 
ner, as well as the "comeliness of his person," that ob- 
tained him the friendship of Jonathan, who "loved him 
as his own soul ;" and it was his remarkable courage and 
address, that gained him the esteem of" all Israel and 
Judah," as well as the dread of Saul, who envied and 
feared his abilities. It was skill " to work in gold and 
silver and brass, to cut stones, and to carve timber," 
that distinguished Bezaleel and Aholiab from the rest of 
their brethren in the tvilderness ; ^s genius for all works 
of art hath always distinguished one man from another 
in all countries. God himself hath been pleased to point 
out to us the remarkable faith of Abraham, the eminent 
meekness of Moses, and the singular patience of Job^ 
admirable qualities which " cannot be hid !" 

As qualities distinguish men, so do public offices. 



DISTINGUISHES HIM FROM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 97 

Thus Daniel was distinguished in the court of Darius, 
and thus Joseph was noted in that of Pharaoh ; for pub- 
lic offices are instituted for the convenience of many, 
and they who hold them are bound to execute them 
faithfully ; and envy as well as respect keeps a watch- 
ful eye on the conduct of such men. You may see what 
passes in the whole world by the tranactions of a little 
parish. The integrity and humanity of a good man in 
a parish-office may expose him to the censure of a few ; 
hut it will always secure him the esteem of all such as 
■know how to value uprightness and sympathy. Happy 
the man who always acts with a view to examination 
and account, who, in private, places himself before both 
the judgment of his fellow-creatures, and the tribunal of 
a righteous God ! 

Where a man holds a public office of great import- 
ance, when he hath all the great abilities and virtues 
necessary to the discharge of the trust, and when he ac- 
tually so discharges it as to render remarkable services 
to society, all the reasons for being every where known 
will unite in this one man, and he " cannot be hid." 
He is a man, and fatigue of business will make nourish- 
■ment and refreshment necessary ; but on pressing occa- 
sions such a man will deny himself for the public good, 
and, to use a scriptural expression, he will remember, 
the saying that is written, " The zeal of thine house 
hath eaten me up." 

Such was the condition of Jesus Christ, when he went 
into the borders of Tyre and Sidon, " and entered into 
an house, and would have no man know it : but he could 
not be hid." I think, I see three principal reasons, be- 
side that just now mentioned, for the conduct of our Sa- 
viour. "He would have no man know it." Why? 
Because he would fulfil prophecy . . . explain his own 
character . . . and leave us an example of virtue. Once, 
"when great multitudes followed him, and he healed 
them all, he charged them that they should not make 
him known ; that it might be fulfilled which was spoken 
by Esaias the prophet, saying, Behold, my servant shall 
not cause his voice to be heard in the streets ;" that is, 
he shall not affect popularity, nor stoop to use any arti- 
9 



98 THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST 

i 

fice to make proselytes. Most likely this was one reason 
of o«l7 Lord's desiring to be concealed on the occasion 
mentioned in the text. Probably, he intended also to 
explain his own character to the family where he was. 
.Tesus was a person of singular modesty, and a high de- 
gree of every virtue, that can adorn a man, was a char- 
acter of the promised Messiah. It was necessary to 
give frequent proofs by his actions of the frame and 
temper of his heart, and he discovered the tenderness 
of a friend to the family where he was, and to his disci- 
ples, who were along with him, just as he had done be- 
fore, when there were so " many coming and going, 
that they had no leisure so much as to eat." Then, 
^' he said unto his apostles. Come ye yourselves apart 
into a desert place, and rest awhile. And they depart- 
ed into a desert place by ship privately." Further, in 
the case before us we have a fine example of the con- 
duct proper for men exalted above their fellows. They 
ought not to make a public show of themselves, nor to 
display their abilities in vain ostentation. All their 
abilities should scent of piety and the fear of God. The 
apostle Paul reproved the Corinthians for abusing ex- 
traordinary gifts to make the people think them proph- 
ets and spiritual persons, while they ought to have ap- 
plied them " to the edifying of the church." " God," 
adds this apostle, '' is not the author of confusion ; but of 
peace." For such reasons, w^e suppose, our blessed Sa- 
viour desired concealment in this house ; and so much 
right had he to rest after a journey, to refresh himself 
with food and sleep, to retire from the malice of his en- 
emies, and to enjoy all the uninterrupted sweets of pri- 
vacy, that had not his presence been indispensably ne- 
cessary to the relief and happiness of mankind, one 
would have wished to have hushed every breath, and 
to have banished every foot, lest he should have been 
disturbed : " but he could not be hid. His fame had 
gone abroad into all the land, and throughout all Syria ;" 
and his wisdom exceeded his fame, '' the one half of the 
greatness of it was not told." Enough, however, had 
been said to engage a woman in distress for a young 
daughter, to come and solicit relief. A woman in like 



DISTINGUISHES HIM FRON ALL OTHER PERSONS. 99 

clistress once went to the prophet Elisha, and when his^ 
officious servant Gehazi came near to thrust her away, 
the man of God said, " Let her alone, for her soul is vexed 
within her." In both instances, it was a case of deep 
distress. Who but God can tell the pangs of a mother's 
heart 1 In both cases it was an appeal to compassion, 
and in both cases wisdom administered instant relief. 
Should such a person " be hid ?" Thanks be to God, it 
is impossible ! This woman forbids silence ; her daugh- 
ter, her family, her neighbours, all others, who had 
been relieved by Jesus Christ, prophets, apostles, chris- 
tians of all ages, and of all countries forbid a conceal- 
ment of him : he himself will justify the conduct, and to 
€very Pharisee, who saith, " Master, rebuke thy disci- 
ples," he will reply, " I tell you, that if these should 
hold their peace, the stones would immediately cry 
out." 

Christians, let us feast our souls this afternoon with 
this heavenly manna ; and, in order to give our medita- 
tion a kind of form, let us remark . . . that Jesus Christ 
is not hid . . . that Jesus Christ ought not to be hid . . . 
and that Jesus Christ cannot be hid. O may that God, 
" whom we serve with our spirits in the Gospel of hia 
son," preserve us from being " ashamed of the Gospel 
of Christ !" 

I say, Jesus Christ tV not hid. Have you observed, 
my brethren, one word of the apostle Paul in his speech 
to king Agrippa ? " The king, before whom I speak 
freely, knoweth of these things ; for I am persuaded that 
none of these things are hidden from him, because this 
thing," the resurrection of Christ from the dead, " was 
not done in a corner." This is one argument for the 
truth of the resurrection of Christ, and so of the whole 
of revelation, which we are taught by our apostle to 
use. This is a " tried stone," upon which we may build 
our faith with all possible safety, and in defiance of 
every attack. When " the hail shall sweep away the 
refuge of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding- 
place," this ^'precious jcorner-stone" shall support the 
whole Christian Religion. 

The prophet Isaiah defended the Jewish religion oq 



100 Tfte BteRIT* Oi' JESTTS CHRBT 

this principle, and reproached false prophets, who pre- 
tended to call up and consult the souls of departed men, 
in this descriptive manner : " Seek not unto them that 
peep and mutter. Should a people seek for the living 
among the dead ? Should not a people seek unto their 
God ?" How much like a servant of the God of the 
whole earth doth he look, when he steps forward and 
saith, " I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of 
the earth ;" I say " Look unto me, and be ye saved, all 
the ends of the earth !" The prophet saith more ; In 
the name of God, " hear ye this, I have not spoken in 
secret from the beginning-." This was very true, for 
Moses published his commission in the court of Pharaoh, 
and confirmed it by miracles in the land of Ham. 
Hence he informed the Jews in the wilderness, that the 
" commandment, which he commanded" them, was " not 
hidden from them, neither was it far off. It is not," said 
he, " in heaven, that thou shouldest say. Who shall go 
up for us to heaven, and bring it unto us, that we may 
hear it, and do it ? Neither is it beyond the sea, that 
thou shouldest say. Who shall go over the sea for us, and 
bring it unto us, that we may hear it, and do it ? But 
the word is very nigh unto thee, in thy month, and in 
thy heart, that thou mayest do it." A passage quoted 
by the apostle Paul, and applied by him with equal 
force to the Christian religion, and from which he made 
this just inference, " Whosoever believeth on the Lord 
Jesus, shall not be ashamed." 

There is not in the Christian Religion a single article 
of faith or practice unpublished to the world. The 
Jews knew, the Greeks knew, and we know, the time 
and the place, the family and the circumstances of the 
birth of Christ. His doctrine spoken at first " in the 
ear in closets," hath been, according to his express or- 
der, " proclaimed upon the house-tops." This remark- 
able charge he gave to his friends, " Be not afraid of 
them that kill the body. He that denieth me before 
men, shall be denied before the angels of God. What I 
tell you in darkness, that speak ye in light ; for there is 
nothing hid that shall not be known." Herod saw him, 
the multitude keard him, Nicodemus consulted him, th6 



DISTINGUISHES HIM FROM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 101 

doctors in the temple conversed with him, the Scribes 
and Pharisees and Sadducees questioned him, Pilate and 
Caiaphas tried him, the Roman soldiers saw him die, 
and beheld him also rise from the dead ; " Jerusalem 
was filled with his doctrine," his fame was known at 
Rome, and the faith of that church was " spoken of 
throughout the whole world ;" and one single messen- 
ger preached his Gospel fully from Jerusalem unto Illy- 
ricum, that is, through a compass of two thousand miles. 
Jesus himself " spake openly to the world ; he ever 
taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, whither the 
Jews always resorted, and in secret he said nothing." 
Observe the remarkable words of our Lord, " Behold ! 
they know what I said." Yes, they understood him, the 
devils knew he came to destroy their empire, and they 
hated him for it ; and the wicked Jews knew he meant 
to subdue their passions, and they crucified him for the 
attempt. So true is this expression of Paul, "This 
thing was not done in a corner !" 

Hence we reason thus : if Jesus Christ was thus pub- 
licly known ; if he was put to death, and rose from the 
dead in a great and populous city ; if his iniquitous judg- 
es with all the power of government in their hands, 
with the most violent inclination to make use of it, and 
with actual repeated trials in open courts, could not dis- 
cover any fraud; and if, on the contrary, his judges 
were compelled against their will to pronounce him in- 
nocent ; and if forty days after his death his crucifiers 
were " pricked in their heart" with shame and remorse 
for what they had done, and became his disciples and 
followers ; then " Christ is risen from the dead," our 
faith is firm, not vain, and " he must reign till he hath 
put all things under his feet." Jesus Christ " is not hid," 
he is ascended to God, and at his right hand he will sit, 
till he " shall appear the second time without sin unto 
salvation." 

Brethren, Jesus Christ ought not to be hid; for if ever 
any person had no reason to blush, if ever any one had 
reason to look the world in the face, our Divine Saviour 
is that person. I. am always moved with pity and as- 
tonishment when I see a sneaking Christian, afraid if 
9* 



102 THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST 

not ashamed to own his Lord. We forgive Peter, for 
his master was then on trial, and he himself was fierce- 
ly attacked by desperate Jews : but what excuse can be 
made, timorous Christian ! for you, who, now that Christ 
hath risen from the dead, and is " declared to be the 
Son of God with power," blush among Christians to be 
accounted "one of them?" What are you afraid of? 
Make full proof of the character you assume. Follow 
your guide. " Curse and swear," and say, " I know not 
the man." 

There is more truth in the profession of such a Christ 
tian than he is aware of. He saith, " I know not the 
tnan." True, you do not know him as he is to be 
known, and your ignorance occasions your fear. O I 
did you know the dignity of his person and the emir 
tience of his love ; did you know the worth of his doc- 
trine and the excellence of his example ; did you know 
your obligations to him and his intentions of goodness to 
you ; you would say to him, " O Lord, I have gone astray 
like a lost sheep ; seek thy servant ! Let me not be 
ashamed of my hope ! How sweet are thy words untd 
my taste ! I will speak of thy testimonies before kings, 
and will not be ashamed." 

Such a Christian affects honour. I commend him. 
Such a Christian would have nothing in his religion to be 
ashamed of I admire his disposition. There are as- 
semblies, and even assemblies called religious, of which 
sense of honour ought to make each of us say, " O my 
soul, come not thou into their secret : unto their assem- 
bly, mine honour ! be not thou united : instruments of 
cruelty are in their habitations." There is many a pil- 
grimage, and many a path travelled by men under pre- 
tence of religion, to each of whom it may be truly said, 
•4 The journey that thou takest is not for thine honour ;" 
it neither does honour to thine understanding, nor to thine 
heart. I repeat it again, all men, even the meanest of 
mankind, ought to regard their reputation, and, especial- 
ly in an affair so public as that of the profession of a 
religion, should believe nothing, and do nothing to be 
ashamed of. Let " walking in craftiness, handling the 
tpord of Grod deceitfully," and all other " things of 4is- 



DISTINGUISHES HIM FROM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 10^ 

honesty be hidden :" let Achan say of his Babylonish 
garment, his two hundred shekels of silver, and his 
wedge of gold, " Behold I coveted them, and took them, 
and they are hid in the earth in the midst of my tent :" 
let the deceitful tradesman, who "goes beyond and de- 
frauds his brother in any matter," let him conceal the 
art by which he gets, the book in which he sets down, 
the place in which he hides, and the use to which he 
applies his " wages of unrighteousness :" let the " eye 
of the adulterer wait for the twilight, saying. No one 
^hall See me," and let him " disguise his face :" all 
these inen " are of those that rebel against the light, 
for the tnorning is to them even as the shadow of death,*' 
and they are always, if one know them, as they ought 
to be, " in the the terrors of the shadow of death." But 
is JeSus Christ one of this midnight band? Is his Gospel a 
talent for a " wicked and slothful servant to hide in the 
earth?" Let us understand our religion better. Let us 
paint, if we can, the fire and the force of that angel of a 
inan, who in open court, in the place of hearing, be- 
fore the principal man of a large city, in the presence 
of chief captains, governors, and gods upon earth, cried, 
" At mid-day, O king ! I saw a light at mid-day, O king 1" 
Consider, bashful christians ! consider the dignity of 
the person of your Divine Master. Strictly speaking, 
Christ hath a dignity of person, and a dignity of office ; 
he is the wisest and the best of persons in the highest 
of all possible preferment. He is not merely what Job 
wished for, a days-man betwixt God and man, that is, an 
umpire for a day to settle one difference : but he is a 
"priest forever, the Son," who is "consecrated for 
evermore to make intercession for us." Is there any 
thing in this noble office, so worthy^~of the justice and 
goodness of God to institute, so honourable in Jesus 
Christ to execute, so necessary to the religion of man- 
kind to receive, to be ashamed of? Let those, who 
have " lords many and gods many," be ashamed and 
confounded ; but, let us, who have " but one God the 
Father, of whom are all things, and we in him ; and one 
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things, and we by 
him y^ let 4IS glory \tk out God and Saviour. Christians 



104 THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST 

should be, I had almost said, proud of this golden seti' 
tence, " There is one God, and one Mediator between 
God and men, the man Christ Jesus." Conceal what, 
the perfections of God ? Hide what, the life of the 
world, " the light of men," Christ Jesus ? Blush at 
what, that " God is not ashamed to be called our God ;" 
that Christ is not '' ashamed to call us brethren ?" This 
is not the pride of a beggar; this is the rage and mad- 
ness of a devil : a sullenness that should have no quar- 
ter in the bosom of a Christian. 

Consider the eminence of the love of Christ. It 
would be saying little to affirm that he gave us his time, 
his advice, his apostles, his friendship and good wishes ; 
he did more; he gave us ''himself: his own body on 
the tree to heal our stripes ;" his character to be dis- 
graced with that of transgressors ; his liberty as that of 
a sheep under the hands of her shearers ; and his soul 
to be " poured out unto death," an " oifering for sin" 
to justify many. Brethren, we celebrate the praise of 
such men as love their country so as to " expose their 
lives unto death in the field," especially if they " take 
no gain of money ;" we call such men " stars in their 
courses," fighting against Sisera ; we say of such men, 
they " came to the help of the Lord against the mighty" 
robbers and murderers of his creatures ; in such cases 
of extreme danger, we forgive a woman forgetting for 
a moment her sex, and shedding a tyrant's blood, and 
we praise the soft hand for taking for once " the nail 
and the workman's hammer," and '' piercing through the 
temples" of the chief of plunderers ; we say of her, 
" Blessed above women shall she be !" If the saviour of 
our liberties and properties and natural lives be so wor- 
thy of publication and praise, what must we think of 
him, who without fee or reward, from principles of the 
strictest justice and the greatest love, redeemed us from 
sin, and all its fatal consequences ? Conceal what, per- 
fect justice and disinterested love? Hide what, that 
*' Christ, when we were without strength, died for the 
ungodly ?" Blush at what, that '' when we were ene- 
mies, we were reconciled to God by the death, of his 
Son, and that as sin hath reigned unto death, even so 



DISTINGUISHES fil» FHoM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 105 

shall grace reign through righteousness, unto eternal 
life by Jesus Christ our Lord ? Ungrateful shame ! do 
we " thus requite the Lord that bought us ?" 

Fearful soul! observe the worth of the doctrine of 
Christ. David thought the law " better than thousands 
of gold and silver." What would he have said, if he 
had received along with the law all the Prophecies, and 
all the New Testament ? The man, who had these, call- 
ed them " treasures of wisdom and knowledge, unsearch- 
able riches" of Christianity. Every part of the doc- 
trine of Christ is wise and good, and there is not a line 
of his Gospel that needs concealment. His doctrines 
are not a troop of robbers lurking in darkness to work 
mischief, but they are an army to defend in broad day- 
light the worship of God, and all the just rights of man- 
kind. I lay aside the whole, though each part would 
bear the most strict scrutiny in this view ; and I confine 
ihysejf to one character of the whole Christian religioii 
stated and explained by the apostle Paul. He says, that 
there were in his doctrine " all riches of the full assur- 
ance of understanding to the acknowledgment of the 
mystery of God, and of the Father, and of Christ, where^ 
in" (see the margin of your Bibles), wherein '• are hid 
all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." By the 
mystery of God, and so on, the Apostle means the 
Christian religion, which had been formerly a mystery^ 
or a secret, but which was then " made known unto the 
sons of men." In this religion, he says, all treasures of 
wisdom and knowledge are hid, that is, every article of 
information necessary to our salvation is contained. One 
chief excellence of the wisdom contained in the Gospel 
is, that it hath a character of evidence ; it is rich in 
proof of its truth and goodness, so rich as to produce the 
'' full assurance of the understanding." The Christian 
t-eligion doth not direct its professors to say. Perhaps 
there is a God, possibly he might create the world, may 
be he sent his Son to instruct and bless mankind, per- 
adventure we may be good and happy by believing and 
practising this religion : language fit enough for a drow- 
iy Rabbi uttering traditions of men ; but a language not 
proper to a wise God, aad his inspired messenger^. 



106 THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST 

" Thus saith the Lord," said the prophets ; " This com- 
mandment have I received of my Father," said Jesus 
Christ ; " We preach not ourselves," said an apostle ; 
" God hath shined in our hearts, and the excellency of 
the power is of God and not of us." This is the Gos- 
pel, of which you, feeble and timorous souls, are asham- 
ed ! There is one point, which I ought not to conceal 
fromyou, for p erhaps you may err more through igno- 
rance than malice. Perhaps, you " know not the man." 

Have you attended to one word of the apostle Paul 
concerning the subject, of which we are speaking, which 
we justi],ow called proof, or evidence of the truth of the 
Christian religion, and which the apostle calls " mani- 
festation of the truth ? " That word is conscience. Hear 
our apostle. " By manifestation of the truth we com- 
mend ourselves to every man's conscience in the sight 
of God." Now, if you mistake conscience for conve-- 
nience, and address the Gospel not to the natural jus- 
tice, but to the pride and prejudices of mankind, you 
may very well tremble for the fate of the Gospel, and 
be ashamed of professing such an inconvenient religion. 
If, on the contrary, you appeal to the consciences of 
men, the very worst will be obliged to own, that the 
morality of the Gospel is holy^ and every part of it just 
and good ; and that if that which is good, works dislike 
in any, it is because they are carnal, and sold under sin. 
What we affirm of the morality of the Gospel, we affirm 
of the just principles on which it is founded, and the 
just motives by which it is enforced. Now we affirm, 
with the Apostle, that the truth hath not only a charac- 
ter of evidence to the conscience, but that the proofs 
are innumerable, and beyond all valuation. They are 
riches^ riches of assurance, riches of full assurance, pro- 
ducing " steadfastness of faith in Christ." 

If you think fit to pursue this subject further, you 
may inquire after the worth of the doctrine of Christ 
among poor, sick, afflicted, persecuted, and dying Chris- 
tians ; they will tell you, it is their only support, and 
their all-sufficient consolation : or you may ask the 
young, the rich and prosperous disciples of Christ, and 
they will tell you^ it " puts more gladness into their 



DISTINGUISHES HIM FROM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 1(^7 

hearts than all the times in which their corn and their 
wine increased :" in short, in the '' temple of God every 
one speaks of his glor}^," and every one saith to the 
bashful Christian, ''Worship the Lord in the beauty of 
holiness by giving unto him the glory due unto his 
name." There is nothing to be ashamed of in the doc- 
trine of Christ, nor need any man blush for believing 
what all the reasonable part of the world allow to be 
true. Let us not creep slily to worship God, and ren- 
der by our meanness " the table of the Lord contempti- 
ble." Let us listen to him, who saith, " A son honour- 
eth his father, and a servant his master : if then I be a 
Father, where is mine honour?" Let us reply to this 
gentle reproof, " The Lord is my light, whom shall I 
fear? The Lord is the strength of my life, of whom 
shall I be afraid? Though an host should encamp 
against me, my heart shall not fear ; though war should 
rise against me, in this will I be confident." 

Should I proceed to examine the excellence of the 
example of Christ, our obligations to him, and his kind 
intentions towards us, it would appear, that Jesus Christ 
ought not to be hid^ and that those servants who thought 
his livery fit only to be worn within doors, and that 
of the world most proper to appear in abroad, have 
not well understood the Christian religion. Their con- 
duct implies an abominable error, a cruel slander upon 
the best of masters, that is, that- there is some error, 
some injustice, or some impropriety in the Christian re- 
ligion. Such people look less like the disciples of 
Christ, " whom God hath exalted to be a Prince and a 
Saviour," than the followers of " Theudas, who boasted 
of himself to be somebody, and to whom a number of 
men joined themselves, but who was slain, and all his 
followers scattered and brought to nought." 

Let us remark, finally, that Jesus Christ cannot be 
hid. Long before we were born " the Lord multiplied 
visions, and used similitudes, and spoke of him by the 
ministry of the prophets." When he made his public 
appearance, " innumerable multitudes trod one upon 
another" to hear him. When he died, he was lifted 
up from .the earth, and drew the attention of " all me» 



108 THE ME^T OF JESUS CHRIST 

uoto him." The Pharisees could prevail nothing ; but 
exclaimed, " Behold, the M'ord is gone after him." Ma- 
ny nations have said, " How beautiful are the feet of 
them, that preach the Gospel of peace ! Have they not 
heard ? yes, verily, the sound went into all the earth, and 
the words unto the ends of the world. Did not Israel 
know ?" Did not Ephesus and Antioch know ? Did not 
Rome know? Did not Spain, Britain, and all the prov- 
inces of the empire know ? These " foolish nations ask- 
ed not after him," but he was found of them though they 
sought him not. It is now too late to think of conceal- 
ing a person so well known, and whom every eye shall 
see in the day of judgment. 

As the person of Christ cannot be hid, so neither can 
his doctrine. There is, my brethren, a beautiful con- 
nexion established in the world between the condition 
of man and the compassion of God. Blessings are pre- 
pared for our necessities, and our necessities prepare us 
•to receive these blessings. Doth God intend to incline 
the Egyptians to support the children of Jacob ? A long 
train of events, with a dreadful famine in the land shall 
endear a son of Jacob both to the prince and the peo- 
ple. The wise frugality of Joseph is a preparation for 
famine, and famine is a dicipline to bring the Egyptians 
acquainted with Joseph, and perhaps with Joseph's God. 
It was God, who both " called for a famine and sent a 
man before" to provide for it. Did the Egyptians, when 
the famine was very sore in the land " cry unto Pha- 
raoh for bread ? Pharaoh said. Go unto Joseph." The 
necessity of the Egyptians, and the office of Joseph ren- 
dered it impossible for him to be hid. He was known, 
Pharaoh called him a " revealer of secrets," and the 
Egyptians honoured him with the name of" tender father." 
Thus the necessities of mankind oblige them to look out 
for a bosom of pity and love. And such an one is that 
of Jesus Christ. " He could npt be hid," saith my text, 
" because a certain woman, whose young daughter had 
an unclean spirit, heard of him, and came and fell at his 
feet, saying. Lord, help me ; the dogs under the table 
eat of the children's crumbs." Numbers in the time of 
Christ were in conditions as bad or worse than that of 
this woman, and they must see him or die. 



DISTINGUISHES UlM FROM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 1 09 

What can ignorant, guilty, or afflicted people do with- 
out this friend " born for adversity ?" What can a man 
do, in whom all these disasters meet ? Suppose any one 
of you should get a mischief in harvest-time, and should 
be obliged " to say unto the driver. Turn thine hand and 
carry me home, for I am wounded." Suppose as you 
are carrying home, and your " blood running out of the 
wound into the midst" of the carriage, you should find 
yourself oppressed with a remembrance of all your sins, 
and guilt lie hard and heavy on your conscience ; then 
y^ou would feel your mind overwhelmed with a thick 
midnight ignorance, and something in your soul fore- 
boding danger. Suppose, when your neighbours come 
round, one should shake her headj another wipe her 
eyes with her apron, and a third wring her hands, and 
say, '' Prepare to meet thy God ; behold the Judge of 
all the earth standeth before the door ;" I ask, in such 
a case, would you, could you help asking, " Is there no 
balm in Gilead, no physician there ? Is the harvest of 
life past, the summer ended, and I not saved ?" You 
would ask such questions, the necessity of your case 
would compel you to ask such questions, and perhaps 
there would be no person about you that knew what to 
Say ; perhaps some more intent upon your money than 
your soul, would thrust these questions aside to make 
room for a lawyer to make your will ; and perhaps some 
as ignorant as yourself would quiet you with supersti- 
tion instead of the religion of faith and repentance, say- 
ing, '-'• Peace, peace, when there is no peace ; for there 
is no peace," with the sacrament or without it, " there 
is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked." 

Brethren, are there no death wounds but such as we 
receive in the manner just now mentioned? Fevers, 
consumptions, and old age, do they never kill ; and if ac- 
cidents slay thousands in a hundred years, do not dis- 
eases slay ten thousands every day ? Let us foresee our 
end, and, if nothing else prevail with us, let the neces- 
sity of dying engage us to inquire, " If a man die, shall 
he live again ? If man wasteth away, and give up the 
ghost, where is he ?" Yes, he shall live again, he must 
liv^ again, " the trumpet shall sound and the dead shall 
10 



no, THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST 

be raised ;" " the heavens shall pass away with a great 
noise, the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the 
earth also and the works that are therein shall be burnt 
up ;" " the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven, 
with his mighty angels in flaming fire, taking vengeance 
on thein that know not God, and that obey not the Gospel 
of our Lord Jesus Christ ; who shall be punished with 
everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, 
and from the glory of his power." Are we under a ne- 
cessity of passing through all these events, and will not 
a conviction of this establish the text in regard to us ? 
Jesus Christ '^ cannot be hid ;" our necessities oblige 
us to inquire after him. We are under a necessity of 
dying, and the power that brings us to the grave will 
not consult us about the time or the means. We are 
under a necessity of rising from the dead, and we shall 
have no choice to rise, or to '' sleep in the dust of the 
earth." We are under a necessity of meeting the Judge, 
and standing trial before God : we shall have no choice 
to be tried, or not to be tried. We must of necessity 
live in a future state, either in happiness or misery. 
All these events are fixed, and the whole world can al- 
ter nothing. And do not all these become preachers to 
us ? Doth not conscience within join with events with- 
out, and doth not each sa}^, " I would make supplication 
to my judge ?" " Seek the Lord while he may be found, 
call upon him while he is near." " Surely the floods of 
great waters shall not come nigh unto him, who pray- 
eth unto God in a time when he may be found." 

How many Christians can look back, and bless the 
hand that compelled them to inquire after a Saviour ! 
They were once " at ease in Zion." Affliction joined 
with a prophet, and poured into their ears, " Wo be to 
them that are at ease. Wo to the drunkard. Wo to him 
that striveth with his Maker. Wo to him that buildeth 
his house in unrighteousness, and that useth his neigh- 
bour's service without wages. Wo to him that putteth 
his bottle to his neighbour, and maketh him drunk. Wo 
imto you. Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites." Sur- 
rounded with warnings and proofs of danger, and being 
like Noah "moved with fear," lest the flood coming up- 



distingCishes him from all other persons. Ill 

on ungodly men should carry him away, each entered 
into an examination of himself, and full of a conviction 
of the injustice of his life, the enmity of his heart, and 
the danger of his condition, fell down on his knees, ail 
contrite and broken, and said, " Wo is me, I am undone, 
because I am a man of unclean lips !" The more he 
thought thereon, the more he wept. He seemed to him- 
self like a man woke out of a dream, the day almost 
gone, the night near at hand. He said, '' I perish with 
hunger." I hunger and thirst, not for the perishing- 
things of this world, not for my own innocence, which is 
irrecoverably lost, not merely for repentance, for what 
can repentance do, unless God will accept it; "• I will 
arise and go to my father," and ask him to feed my soul 
with forgiveness : but the nearer I approach him, the 
more fully I perceive he is of " purer eyes than to be- 
hold iniquity." What shall I do ? Or whither shall I 
flee ? Full of these just reflections he became grave, 
serious, and thoughtful, left off his former course of life, 
and forsook his old companions in sin. In vain they 
endeavoured to administer relief by telling him, God 
was merciful, he was no worse than his neighbours, re- 
pentance would make him melancholy, and raptures in 
religion raving mad. To all these he replied, " Miser^ 
able comforters are ye all. If your soul were in my 
soul's stead, I also could speak as ye do." Christians 
came round him ; he read the book, and heard the Gos- 
pel, from which they assured him they had derived in- 
struction, that had relieved them in the same condition. 
He thought within himself, I am in the condition of the 
four lepers, who sat between the walls of a city perish- 
ing with famine, and the army of an enemy full of rich- 
es and plenty of provisions, and who reasoned thus : " If 
we say we will enter into the city, then the famine is 
in the city, and we shall die there ; and if we sit still 
here, we die also." We will repair unto the army, *■' if 
they save us alive, we shall live, and if they kill us, we 
shall but die." He applied this to himself, and said, if I 
return to the practice of sin, I shall be inevitably lost; 
if i continue as I am, reflection and remorse will make 
me die with despair : I have been an enemy to good 
men, and even fighting against God ; ^' my soul hath 



i.l2 THE MERIT OF JESUS CHRIST ' 

loathed them, and their soul also hath abhorred" such 
characters as mine ; however, 1 wili repair to Christian 
assemblies; the church is Bethesda, a house of mercy, 
" it may be that the Lord of hosts will be gracious :" 
yet God is a just and holy being, and his law saith, " The 
soul that sinneth, it shall die ;" at all events, I must go, 
and " I will go in unto the kmg^ which is not according 
to the law, and if I perish, I perish." To how many 
trembling souls hath God, who " delighteth in mercy," 
held out the golden sceptre of grace, and said. What wilt 
thou ? it shall be given thee ! Hence that joy unspeak- 
able and full of glory, that " health of the countenance," 
that '' strength of the heart," and all the holy exercises 
of a pious, just, and benevolent life, " full of mercy and 
good fruits." 

Whither hath this subject carried me ! I have fol- 
lowed it, and I am got beyond what I proposed to treat 
of. I was to show you, that the person of Christ, and 
the Gospel of Christ " could not be hid :" but it seems^ 
the Gospel not only cannot be concealed in the bosom 
of the Saviour, where there is nothing to resist its effu» 
sion toward us ; but it cannot be hid even in the heart 
©fa wretched sinful man, whose dispositions are strong* 
ly bent to confine it. No, religion is of divine origin, 
noble by nature, and disdains confinement. Repentance 
in the heart will get into the eye, and come out into 
company trickling down the cheek in silver drops like 
^ew. Meekness in the heart will make its way to the 
countenance, and sit there smiling like a morning in 
spring ; pity will slide the hand into the purse, and by 
procuring relief for the wretched, publish the inexpressi- 
ble feelings of the heart. Justice will be at ever}^ bar- 
gain, along with every contract, sometimes in the hand 
holding the pen, and at other times in the tongue, say- 
ing both at the manor court and in the field, '' Cursed 
be he that removeth his neighbour's landmark, cursed 
be he that confirmeth not all the words of the law to do 
them." Christianity " cannot be hid." I might go fur- 
ther, and show you, that it will break out, even where 
iVail men, under the power of violent temptation, take 
the utmost pains to suppress it. Whence that hj\lf-en^ 



DISTINGUISHES ftiM FROM ALL OTHER PERSONS. 113 

joyment of sin, which men of little religion, eager to 
glut themselves with it, so often discover? Observe 
Peter. He sat among the enemies of Christ. Said one, 
" Thou wast with Jesus :" No, said he, " woman, I know 
him not." Said another, presently, '^ Thou art one of 
them :" No, said he, " man, I am not." About an hour 
after, a third said, " Surely thou art one of them, foi* 
thy speech betrayeth thee." Was it only the Galilean 
broad country way of speaking that betrayed him ? 
Were there no looks of anxiety toward his master ? No 
indignation in his countenance against the cruel talk of 
the company ? Was there never a sigh stole out un- 
perceived by him, but observed by the company ? Did 
he utter, " I know not the man," without blushing and 
hesitating ? When he began to curse and to swear, did 
he go about his work like a workman, a master blas- 
phemer ? I think not. I think a good man swears, as 
a blasphemer prays, that is, with an ill grace ; the very 
tone and air of the speech betray the temper of the 
heart. 

To conclude. If we love concealment, let us observe 
the kingdom of sin ; it is a kingdom of darkness. Re- 
member what the Scripture calls the place of him that 
knoweth not God. " The light is dark in his taberna- 
cle. The snare is hidden for him in the ground, and a 
trap is set for him in the way. He walketh upon a 
snare, and his own counsel shall cast him down. De- 
struction shall be ready at his side, and the first born of 
death shall devour his strength. He shall be chased 
out of the world, and be brought to the king of terrors. 
He shall flee from the iron weapon, and the bow of steel 
shall strike him through. The heaven shall reveal his 
iniquity, the earth shall rise up against him, and he 
shall drink of the wrath of the Almighty. This is the 
portion of a wicked man, the heritage appointed unto 
him by God." God grant us grace " to flee from the 
wrath to come." To him be honour and glory for ever. 
Amen. 

10* 



DISCOURSE VII. 

JESUS CHRIST THE MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHER?. 
lAT ST^PLEFORD.} 



JOHN vii. 46. 
Never man spake like this man. 

So said the officers, whom the Pharisees and chief 
priests had sent to take Jesus Christ into custody, as- 
signing this as a reason why they had not executed their 
commission : but before we attend to what they say, we 
will make two observations on the officers themselves, 
and the offices they held. 

Observe, first, how dangerous it is to a man's virtue 
to hold places in some times, under some governments. 
It is impossible to. be truly happy without being truly 
good and virtuous; it is impossible to be good without 
being free ; and it is impossible to be free without be- 
ing independent ; for he, who depends on a master for 
his whole support, and who hath the misfortune to serve 
an unjust master, cannot obey some orders without giv- 
ing up either his integrity or his livelihood, and few 
men have goodness enough to give up the last for the 
sake of the first. These officers of the board of priests 
were in this dangerous condition. They were kept for 
the sake of executing such orders as their unjust mas- 
ters thought fit to issue. It was on the day of a great 
religious festival, when the inhabitants of Jerusalem 
were performing their devotions, that these priests held 
» council) and, having determined to seize the person 



dEStrs fcHRisf^ &Ci lis 

of Christ, sent these officers to take him. When they 
returned without him, their masters reproved them, and 
gave them a very just notion of their condition, by say- 
ing, " Have any of the rulers believed on him ?" To 
which the officers made no reply, for they thoroughly 
understood that underlings in office are not supposed to 
have any sentiments of their ovi^n, but receive their sal- 
aries for doing only what they are bid. 

These men might have known this by reading their 
own Bible. There the punishment denounced against 
the family of Eli is described. " Every one shall come 
and crouch to the high priest for a piece of silver, and 
a morsel of bread, and shall say. Put me, I pray thee, 
into one of the priest's offices, that I may eat a piece of 
bread." It was not the poverty, but the cringing slav- 
ishness of the family, that was intended in the threat- 
ening, a part of which was, "they that despise me shall 
be lightly esteemed." There also, in the tenth Psalm, 
are fully described the practices of those who make 
slaves, and the misery of those poor people, who sub- 
mit to slavery for the sake of worldly advantages. The 
first are said to be men of" strong parts," whose " mouths 
are full of deceit," who " sit in the lurking places of the 
villages," and who " crouch like lions in their dens to 
catch the poor in a net." The last are said to be 
" poor, fatherless, and oppressed, taken in times of trou- 
ble, in the devices imagined" by their betrayers. O the 
ingenious devices ! O the goodly pretences, which both 
sides use to carry on this " merchandise of slaves and 
souls of men." Let us learn to live by our own in- 
dustry, then we shall be independent : let us live within 
our income, then we shall be virtuous : let us never fix 
our attention on public money, then we shall be free, 
at least we shall never be obliged by a pretended duty 
of office to violate an actual duty of religion. Some 
miserable parents train up their children at a great ex- 
pense, and with great guilt ; and having at length taught 
them to be very expensive themselves, and not having 
a fortune to support luxury, they are obliged to sell 
them to the highest bidder, and expect to be repaid by 
ttutiing these hungry wolves out upon the public. What 



11$ :fESUS CHRIST * 

a beggarly ambition, to be a Pharisee's man ! How 
much better, because how much more innocent, is it to 
be an honest day-labourer ! Little do labouring men 
think what Pharisees and task-masters and Pharoahs say 
to their officers in private, and how well the officers of 
such men are trained up to understand looks, and hints, 
and half-words, where no express orders are given ! 
Some officers of these priests, perhaps the same men 
who uttered the text, '' took Jesus and bound him ;" and 
one of tliem, perhaps to make peace with his masters 
for not having done his duty before, " struck him with the 
palm of his hand" in open court, and said, '^ Answerest 
thou the high priest so ?" For Jesus Christ had just 
said to the high priest, " Ask them which heard me 
what I said ; behold they know what I said ;" referring 
very likely to this very saying in the text, " Never man 
spake like this man." 

However, let charity expound this history ; and let 
us observe in the next place, and let us hope for the 
honour of human nature it is true, that there are up- 
right men, who dare not execute some unjust commis- 
sions, though they seem bound by office to do so. Such 
instances are rare ; but there have been instances of 
men, who have quitted offices, and all the wealth and 
honours annexed to them, rather than do an unjust 
thing. It is said to the honour of two women, who held 
a useful office in Egypt, that they did not commit mur- 
der " as the king commanded them ;" and to their in- 
tegrity we owe that eminent servant pf God, Moses. 
How many such as Moses we have been deprived of by 
such orders, " the day shall declare." 

When these officers went to take Jesus Christ, he was 
"standing in the temple and speaking boldly of the 
spirit, which they that believe on him should receive, 
when the Holy Ghost should be given, after he was glo- 
rified." Very likely our Lord was expounding some of 
the prophecies, for he said, " If any man thirst, let him 
come unto me, and drink. He that believeth on me, as 
the Scripture hath said, out of his heart shall flow riv- 
ers of living water." It must have been very delight- 
ful to hear Jesus Christ explain the prophecies, and 



THE Most EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS. 1 If^ 

particularly such as are contained in the thirty-fifth and 
forty-fourth of Isaiah, the second chapter of Joel, and 
other places, where the Holy Spirit is spoken of under 
the similitude of a well, or a spring in the minds and 
hearts of inspired men. " The mouth of a righteous 
man is a well of life," and Christian knowledge is a 
" well of water springing up into everlasting life." 

" Many of the people, when they heard this" dis* 
course, were persuaded that the speaker was an extra- 
ordinary person, and others thought, he was the prom- 
ised Messiah. " Many said, of a truth this is the Pro- 
phet," that is, the Prophet spoken of by Moses ; others 
said, " This is the Christ." The officers ventured to 
say in general, " Never man spake like this man." We 
unite these opinions, and affirm, Jesus is the Prophet 
like Moses, he is the Christ, he is the man who spoke 
as no man but himself ever did speak ; and we are go- 
ing to show you this evening that Jesus Christ is the 
most excellent of all teachers. They who were so hap- 
py as to attend his ministry, as it is written in the 
Prophets, were " all taught of God ;" and they who are 
so happy as to hear his doctrine now, though not hon- 
oured to hear it from his own lips, may truly say, " Mas- 
ter, we know that thou teachest the way of God in truth." 
" Blessed is the man, O Lord, whom, thou teachest out of 
thy law," though not out of thine own mouth. 

Our Divine Instructer excelled all others in that em- 
inent qualification of a public teacher, a " perfect knowl- 
edge of what he taught." Jesus Christ understood the 
subject of religion : Jesus Christ understood the whole 
of religion : and Jesus Christ understood the whole per- 
fectly. I say our instructer understood religion, and 
herein he differed from many who have pretended to 
instruct mankind ; but who, to use the language of an 
apostle, have taught " fables and questions, which have 
turned men aside unto vain jangling, understanding nei- 
ther what they said, nor whereof they affirmed." The 
heathens pretended to teach religion ; but what they 
taught for religion was superstition founded upon fable, 
and their instructions concerning worship and devotion, 
all led an ignorant multitude after their ignorant teach- 



118 JESUS CHRIST 

era up to " an altar with this inscription, ' To the un-. 
known God.' " None of these men ever saw God at any 
time ; but it was the only-begotten Son, who was " in 
the bosom of the Father," who declared him to us. To 
be in the bosom of any one, signifies to know that per- 
son thoroughly : in this sense Jesus Christ was in the 
bosom of the Father, and hence this expression, " No 
man knoweth the Father save the vSon, and he to whom- 
soever the Son will reveal him." And again, " No 
man hath seen the Father, save he, which is of God, he 
hath seen the Father." I said, Jesus Christ understood 
the whole of religion : and herein he differed from all 
the Prophets, who searched " what the spirit of Christ 
which was in them did signify," and from all the apos- 
tles, who '' knew only in part, and prophesied only in 
part." The understanding of Jesus Christ comprehend- 
ed the past, the present, and the future ; and this is one 
reason for his saying to his servant John, " I am Alpha 
and Omega, the first and the last ; what thou seest, write 
in a book, and send unto the seven churches." Further, 
I said Jesus Christ understood the whole of religion per- 
fectly. His understanding of religion was clear, com- 
plete, full, without any defect, and there is not in all 
the instructions given us by him a single line of guess 
work. He hath built the whole of the Christian reli- 
gion on certain principles, beyond all conjecture and 
peradventure. On this account the Scriptures are call- 
ed the "lively oracles of God," the first principles of 
which were committed to the Jews, carried to perfec- 
tion by the apostles, and given to us with this express 
charge, '^ Minister one to another as good stewards ; if 
any man speak, let him speak as the oracles of God." 
" Never man spake like this man" in regard to a perfect 
knowledge of the subject. 

He knew the perfections of God, the nature of man, 
the laws of Providence, which govern this world, and 
all the distributions of happiness and misery, which will 
take place in the next. Wisdom in him was natural, 
perfect, and eternal, and " of his fulness have all inspired 
writers received, and grace for grace," What a mind, 
what an astonishing mind was that of Jesus Christ ! ff 



THE MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS. 119 

all inspired men were only distributors of his wisdom ; 
if they knew nothing of themselves, and received all 
their jiist sentiments out of his fulness, how far beyond 
all our conceptions of a wise man must Jesus Christ be ! 
What a character of majesty is there in these words, " I 
am the vine, ye are the branches, — without me ye can do 
nothing, — the branch cannot bear fruit of itself!" Chris- 
tians ! follow this heavenly idea of husbandry. Take 
up the fourteen epistles of Paul, and consider them as 
a rich cluster of grapes, like that which " two men bore 
wpon a staff between them," when they returned from 
searching the promised land, and examine what a num- 
ber of just and excellent notions on a multitude of sub- 
jects are contained in them. To these add the writings 
of all the other inspired men, which, like the mantling 
branches of a luxuriant vine, have been shooting out 
their soft tendrils for almost eighteen hundred years 
over all countries, and " bringing forth fruit in all the 
world ;" and ask, Whence had these men this knowledge ? 
And the Jews, even priests, captains, and Sadducees will 
tell you, they '' had been with Jesus," and they them- 
selves will confirm it by saying, '•'• Of his fulness have 
all we received a spirit of prophecy" to enable us to 
prophesy, " divers kinds of tongues, gifts of healing, 
words of wisdom and knowledge," dispositions of piety 
and justice, and every thing else that made us what we 
are ;" " we are the branches, Christ is the vine," without 
him we should have known and done nothing. Hence 
these expressions, " I laboured, yet not 1, but the grace 
of God which was with me ; I live, yet not I, but Christ 
liveth in me. I am not in any thing behind the very 
chiefest apostles, though 1 be nothing." It would be- 
come the wisest of mankind in the presence of these in- 
spired men to say, " We are in our own sight, as we 
were in their sight, as grasshoppers :" but even these 
angels of mankind, in the presence of Jesus Christ, are 
not as grasshoppers, but as nothing. 

Our heavenly Teacher, out of the rich abundance of 
his knowledge, made a judicious choice of the subjects 
of his ministry. This is a second excellence, and it is 
edifying to see what directed his prudent mind in mak- 



J 20 JESUS CHRIST 

ingf the choice. He was governed by the condition of 
his disciples. When he was taking his leave of thern^ 
he said, " I have many things to say unto you, hut ye 
cannot bear them now :" as if he had said, I perfectly 
understand every thing, and did I consult my fame more 
than your good, I would tell you every thing ; but I love 
you, I know the infancy of your faith, and the strength of 
your temptations to be vain in yourselves, forgetful of 
me, undutiful to God, and unprofitable to society ; and 
therefore 1 will adapt my instructions to your present 
condition, and reserve full information till you arrive at 
a perfect state. On this principle all revelation is built, 
and such subjects are taught as are necessary to make 
us good men. So much of history, so much of prophe- 
cy, so much of doctrine, and so much of motives to obe- 
dience are told us as our present condition in this life 
requires. The Christian religion is addressed to a so- 
ber conscience, not to a vain curiosity : it is intended to 
make us righteous, not cunning. 

Our Saviour hath discovered his eminent prudence in 
the choice of his subjects, by selecting what is true, 
important, and proper. The subjects taught by Jesus 
Christ are all strictly and wholly true. The prophets 
speak of two sorts of teachers, whom they plainly call 
teachers of lies. The first were such as taught idola- 
try : " what profiteth a graven image, and a teacher of 
lies ?" What is an idol, or what is a teacher of idola- 
try good for? The whole is falsehood. The second 
were leaders of the people of God, who caused them to 
err by mixing folly and falsehood with divine truth : '' the 
prophet that teacheth lies, he is the tail." Jesus Christ 
was a teacher of truth in opposition to both these. He 
taught the perfections, goverment, and worship of the 
true God, and he mixed no traditions of men with his 
instructions. When truth comes to us through uninspir- 
ed men, it comes to us like light through a dusty or 
discoloured window, so treacherous are the memories, 
and so imperfect are the minds of the best of men : but 
truth coming immediately from Jesus Christ resembles 
the light abroad, all unpolluted and pure. As all his 
doctrines were true, so he chose to make those truths 



tHE MOST EXCELLE-NT OF ALL TEACHERS. 121 

the subjects of his ministrj^, which were important; and 
there is not in all the information given us by him a 
single trifle. Every thing is of the utmost consequence 
for somebody to know, and most articles are of great 
moment to all his disciples. How important to devo- 
tion is it to know the God we adore ! How important 
to the exercise of repentance is the knowledge of our- 
selves ! How important to our faith is the knowledge 
of the true and real character of Jesus Christ ! How im- 
portant to our safety is the knowledge of this world, and 
how necessary to the regulation of our lives is the 
knowledge of the world to come ! In all these articles 
Jesus Christ hath fully instructed us. There are 
truths, from the knowledge of which we should derive 
no more benefit than we should by knowing that a crow 
dropped a feather as she flew over a mountain in Ire- 
land. Our Lord knew the little time and the little ca- 
pacity of his disciples too well, to waste his breath, and 
their attention, about articles of no consequence to them. 
" Lord," said Peter " what shall this man do?" To which 
our Lord replied, " What is that to thee?" How many 
questions, and even questions concerning religion, de- 
serve the same answer, '' What is that to thee ?" Wheth- 
er it be friendship or curiosity, that makes thee inquisi- 
tive about the duty and the fate of John, it is indiiferent ; 
for either would serve, through thy depravity, to divert 
thine attention from thyself I have been telling thee, 
thou shalt live to old age, and then be girded and carried 
to die whither thou wouldest not, and I have been order- 
ing thee to spend the remainder of thy life in feeding my 
sheep and lambs : study thy duty, prepare for thy death; 
what is the fate of John, to thee but a dangerous spec- 
ulation ? " Follow thou me." 

There was in the choice of subjects by Jesus Christ, 
not only truth and importance, but propriety. Every 
thing he taught was proper for him to teach, and suited 
to his disciples to learn. There was a justness in both 
these respects in all his instructions. He never forgot 
his own dignity, so as to utter any thing unsuitable to 
the eminent character he assumed ; and he always at- 
11 



1-22 JE&US CHRIST 

tended to the imperfections and infirmities, the real con- 
ditions and the best interests of his disciples. Were 
they in danger ? He gave them friendly warnings. Did 
they sin ? He gave them gentle, and sometimes sharp 
reproofs. When they were inquisitive on proper sub- 
jects he poured forth instruction ; and when an idle curi- 
osity put them on asking questions, he restrained their 
folly^ and turned their attention to what was substantial, 
and fit for men in their condition to know. When they 
were in trouble, he supported them with the comforts of 
religion ; and when they were attacked by their ene- 
mies, he showed them how to defend themselves with 
the weapons of it. It would be easy to exemplify the 
justness and propriety of all the ministry of Jesus Christ 
by comparing each of his discourses with the persons to 
whom, and the times and circumstances in which it was 
spoken ; but we will leave this for you to examine at 
your leisure. You will find, that though he was always 
humble, yet he was never mean ; you will find him al- 
ways zealous, never frantic ; always kind, never fond ; 
alwa)^s firm, never sour ; always various, yet always the 
same ; his wisdom manifold, but all tending to '4he two 
commandments, on which hang all the law and the proph- 
ets i the first. Thou shalt love thy God with all thy soul ; 
and the second. Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thy- 
self." For choice of subjects true, important, and prop- 
er, " never man spake like this man." 

One chief excellence of our heavenly teacher is the 
plainness of his instructions. All his discourses have 
a singular artlessness and simplicity ; they not only may 
be understood, but they cannot be misunderstood. 
There are none of what an apostle calls " great swelling 
words of vanity," such as an extravagant genius invents 
to give himself consequence. There are no new fine 
terms taken from the court of Herod after the fashiona- 
ble polish of the court of Herod's master the Roman 
Emperor, the language usually of a man, who affects 
not to think and speak like the vulgar. Even the style 
©f the prophets was simplified by him, and Jehovah soft- 
ened into Father. What he affirms of every person and 



THE MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS. 123 

every thing is expressed so clearly, that whoever at- 
tends to his descriptions must take in his meaning, and 
no other. The connection, which he establisheth, be- 
tween one part of religion and another part, is equally 
clear ; as for example, between sin and punishment, 
faith and holiness, repentance and forgiveness, Chris- 
tianity and persecution, holiness and happiness, his own 
glory and that of all his followers. If a person cannot at 
first enter into all these particulars, jet it is impossi- 
ble he should not see the general sense of the Christian 
religion : as, that it is from heaven, that it is an enemy 
to error and sin, that it directs men to be holy, and re- 
wards them for being so, that Christ is a Redeemer, and 
all his people free. When John the Baptist sent two of 
his disciples to inquire of Jesus, whether he were the 
expected Messiah, Jesus answered, '^ Go, and shew John 
the things which ye do hear and see," one of which 
was, " the poor have the gospel preached to them," that 
is to say, the glad tidings of salvation are so preached 
by me that the uneducated poor understand them as 
the prophets foretold. " The king's son shall save 
the children of the needy. He shall come down like 

rain upon" what, think ye, my brethren ? Like 

rain upon the tall cedars, and the lofty mountains, the 
painted tulip, and the snow-white lily ? No, upon the 
" mown grass, and the bare earth ;" " he shall come down 
like rain upon the mown grass, as showers that water 
the earth." This is a constant character of the Messiah 
in the prophecies, and if you doubt whether I have 
given you the true sense of the passage just now men- 
tioned, consult the thirty-fifth chapter of Isaiah, in 
which the prophet considers fools^ that is the poor, ne- 
glected, untaught part of mankind, who are generally re- 
puted fools, as finding, and walking in " the way of holi- 
ness" made " an highway" by the teacher sent from God : 
and he resembles these people to a " wilderness, a lone 
place, a desert, a parched and thirsty piece of ground," 
on account of their being neglected and uncultivated, and 
even despised and cursed by the proud Rabbles. The 
language of a Rabbi to these people wa?, You were " al- 



124 JESUS CHRIST 

together born in sin, yon know not the law, and are 
cursed;" but the language of Jesus Christ was, " Go tell 
John, the poor have the Gospel preached to them. Go 
tell that fox, Herod, I must walk to-day, and to-morrow, 
and the day following, for it cannot be that a prophet 
perish out of Jerusalem." Go, christians, tell the whole 
world that Jesus Christ preached the Gospel to the poor in 
a wicked city, when he knew it would cost him his life. 
For artlessness and simplicity, for a plainness that 
could not but be understood by people the most likely 
10 misunderstand it, " never man spake like this man." 
There is one circumstance mentioned by the prophets, 
and accomplished in the life of Christ, which does great 
honour to his ministry, and which is a full proof of the 
simplicity and plainness of his doctrine ; that is, the 
part which the little folks in Jerusalem, the children of 
the poor inhabitants, took in the ministry of Jesus Christ. 
When Jesus made his public entry into Jerusalem riding 
on a colt, the foal of an ass, '' the multitude, the blind, 
the lame," and even the " children," told the daughter 
of Zion, Behold thy mild and lowly King cometh ; and 
the children sung part of a psalm in honour of the son 
of David, and blessed him that came in the name of the 
Lord. The citizens said, " Who is this ?" The chief 
priests and scribes pretended not to know ; but the mul- 
titude knew, and said. This is Jesus the prophet ; and 
the children knew, and Jesus Christ declared that God 
had '' perfected praise out of the mouths of babes and 
sucklings." " Have ye never read this ?" said he to the 
priests and scribes. We have many instances in the 
Gospel of the sound knowledge, which some of the low- 
est of the people had of the true character of Jesus 
Christ, and we have both a satisfactory account given of 
him, and a fine train of substantial reasoning to support 
that account, by a blind beggar before a council of Rab- 
bles holding a court session. For using great plainness 
of speech " never man spake like this man." 

By what unheard of method did Jesus Christ teach 
poor children and blind beggars to understand the holy 
Scriptures ? By what means did he convey this kind of 
knowledo^e to whole multitudes ? By what art did he 



THP MOST EXCELLENT OP ALL TEACHERS. 125 

carry such full conviction into the niinds of his hearers 
as to force them publicly to express their approbation 
on the spot, and even women, contrary to their usual 
bashfulness, to exclaim, " Blessed is the womb that bare 
thee, and the paps which thou hast sucked V By what 
method did he take twelve " unlearned and ignorant 
men," and enable them so to teach, that the heathens 
took them for the chief of their gods, and would have 
sacrificed oxen adorned with garlands unto them, and 
that the wisest of the Rabbles were " not able to resist 
the wisdom and the spirit by which they spoke ? It was 
by his skill in bringing down the great truths of religion 
to the size of the understandings of his hearers, and by 
doing this without sinking the dignity and importance 
of the truths, and without racking and torturing the 
minds of his disciples. Two things are necessary to this 
plainness of speech ; the one, that the subjects them- 
selves be stated simply without being mixed with other 
subjects, without being rendered abstruse by needless 
arguments and ornaments ; and thus Jesus Christ pro- 
posed his doctrine : and the other, that the persons to 
whom the doctrine is addressed be taught to make use 
of their own understandings ; for it is with the mind as 
it is with the body, a man does not know what he can 
do, till he tries. Both these are included in these words 
of the wise man, " All the words of my mouth are in 
righteousness," or right, " there is nothing froward or 
perverse in them ; they are all plain to him that under- 
standeth," that is, to him who dare make use of his own 
understanding. When the officers listened to Christ, and 
judged for themselves, they thought " Never man spake 
like him ;" but when they returned, and began to inquire 
whether any of the rulers believed on him, the subject 
became perplexed, and this unparalleled teacher seem- 
ed a cheat. All the words of the law were written very 
plainly ; the prophecies were " written plain upon ta- 
bles, that he might run that read them ;" the apostles 
'' used great plainness of speech ;" but for this excel- 
lence Jesus Christ exceeded them all, and " never man 
spake so plainly as this man." 
Another excellence of our heavenly teacher is the 
11* 



126 JESUS CHRIST 

affecting manner^ in which he proposes all his instruct- 
ions to "US. He was himself a person of the finest feel- 
ings. He had fears and hopes, joys and sorrows, anger 
and love, and all the passions of a perfect man. He 
thoroughly knew by his own experience what was in 
man, and was " touched with a feeling of our infirmi- 
ties." His doctrine therefore was taught with emotions 
of pleasure and pain in himself; sometimes he rejoiced 
with his disciples, and sometimes he wept ; and it was 
accompanied with emotions of pleasure and pain in his 
hearers. The subjects of religion are chiefly invisible. 
Who ever saw, or can see God ? Who can see the soul 
of man, or heaven or hell ? What living man can see 
sin in all its effects in regard to God, himself, and other 
creatures? Who hath seen the resurrection of the 
dead, the day of judgment, the spirits of the just, and 
" the devil and his angels ?" " Where wast thou when I 
laid the foundations of the earth ? Have the gates of 
death been opened unto thee ? Shall it be told God 
that we speak of these subjects ? If a man speak, sure- 
ly he shaUbe swallowed up." Yes, my brethren, theSe 
subjects would have swallowed up the capacities of all 
mankind, and there is but one way of making men so 
understand them as to be properly affected with them ; 
so as to have fear enough to make them humble, but 
not enough to drive them mad ; so as to have love 
enough to make them holy, but not enough to make 
them neglect their families, and their employments in 
life ; this way is to use similitudes, and to liken the ob- 
jects which we cannot see, to other objects which we 
do see, and with which we are well acquainted. The 
prophets used this method much, and therefore were 
understood ; the apostle Paul used it least, and therefore 
in all his epistles are some things hard to be understood ; 
but the instructions given us by Jesus Christ are chiefly 
similitudes, and for properly moving the heart, '• never 
man spake like this man." 

For example, what a picture of four of these articles 
doth Jesus Christ give us in the parable of the Prodigal 
Son ! The principal figure is Almighty God, the God of 
the " whirlwind and the storm, whose way is in the sea, 



THE MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS. J2.7 

whose path is in the great waters, and whose footsteps 
are not known ; whose yoice thunders in the heaven, 
and whose lightnings make the earth tremble and shake ; 
whose fury is poured out like the fire, which throws 
down rocks, yea, burns the world, and all that dwell 
therein." In what light doth the parable present this 
God, so terrible to the wicked^ to the eyes of a repenting 
sinner ! It is but one word ; but, my God ! what a 
whole Gospel doth that one word, " Father," contain ! 
A Father patient and silent during all the provocations 
of his son ; a " Father seeing him, when he was a great 
way off, melting with compassion for him, running, fall- 
ing on his neck, and kissing him." A Father cutting 
short the confession of his son, preventing him with his 
goodness, receiving him liberally, and upbraiding him 
not. A Feather ordering, " Bring forth the best robe, 
and bring hither the fatted calf, and let us eat and be 
merry :" a Father filling his house with " music and 
dancing," overflowing with happiness in himself, and 
telling his other son and all his servants, I have " re- 
ceived my son safe and sound ; this my son was dead, and 
is alive again, he was lost and is found !" O lovely pic^ 
fure of the best of beings, my Father and my God, al- 
ways be l^efore my eyes, when I presume to approach 
the " throne of grace to obtain mercy, and to find grace 
to help in time of need !" 

What a picture of sin and wretchedness doth the life 
of the prodigal afford ! A son, a son of such a Father, 
a younger son dead to the edifying example of his elder 
brother, going from home, with all his fortune, into a 
far country, and wasting all his substance in riotous 
living : a son of such a family disgracing himself in the 
service of a swine-herd, a keeper of cattle expressly 
forbidden to be eaten by man, or offered in sacrifice to 
God : a wretch perishing with hunger, and wishing him» 
self one of these execrated animals, that he might eat 
and fatten and die like them : a son who had behaved 
in his prosperity so brutally to others, that in his ex- 
tremity no man would give him even the privilege of a 
beggar, a morsel of bread to save him from starving to 
death : a son trembling at the thought of seeing such a 



128 JESUS CffKIST 

Father, and hardly daring to ask the favour of being ad- 
mitted among the lowest of his servants ! What a num- 
ber of just and affecting ideas of sin are contained in this 
live picture of profligate men ! Every sinner in the 
whole world is in some stage of this wretchedness. 
Some are now receiving, others are now spending, and 
others are half distracted for the waste of their " por- 
tion of goods." In what stage, my hearers, are you? 

There is a third subject, that is, repentance, descri- 
bed in a very pathetic manner, in this parable. The 
son " came to himself," that is, recovered his lost 
senses, his memory, his reason, his duty, his sense of 
honour, respect for his Father, disdain for his condition, 
and a modest ambition to aspire at something like his 
former happy state. Hear him : " How many hired ser- 
vants of my Father have bread enough and to spare, 
and I perish with hunger ! I will arise, and go to my Fa- 
ther." Go, young man, it is the best thing you can do ; 
" the Father of whom you speak is yet alive," and yet 
a Father ; he " knows your sorrows ; behold, he cometh 
forth to meet thee, and when he seeth thee, he will be 
glad in his heart." 

A fourth picture is contained in this parable ; and the 
joy of good men at the repentance of a sinner is set 
forth by the pleasure of the servants, and the censure, 
which the proud and unfeeling part of the Jews passed, 
nndutifully on the goodness of God, and cruelly on the 
condition of such penitents as the Gentiles, is held forth 
in the conduct of the elder brother, who yet at last re- 
covers by the reasoning of his Father from the sullen 
temper, into which he had fallen at the first admission 
of such great sinners into the church of God. This 
short parable is so constructed as to contain a history of 
all times from Adam to the end of the world ; and the 
few characters exhibited in it are almost all, that are 
worth knowing in the universe. The subjects go home 
to the business and bosoms of all mankind, and probably 
his one parable hath " brought many sons to glory." 

It would be easy to show, were it necessary, that the 
same ease, convenience, and address to the passions for 
\he best and noblest purposes run through the whole 



THE MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS. 129 

doctrine of our teacher. Ask an exact philosopher, 
What is conscience ? He will tell you ; It is a man's 
opinion of his own actions. Ask him, What is hell ? He 
will tell you ; It is a state of future punishment. Ask 
him, what repentancd is. He will tell you : It is a sor- 
row for sin. All true ; ail just ; all exact ; but all as 
cold as clear, like a sharp frosty night. Jesus Christ 
will inform you, that repentance is the return of an un- 
dutiful profligate, home to his kind, though insulted Fa- 
ther. Conscience is " the worm that never dieth ;" hell 
is " the fire that never shall be quenched." '' The words- 
that I speak unto you," said he, '' they are spirit, and they 
are life." Hence thousands join with the officers in the 
text^ and say, " Never man spake like this man." 

Finally, consider one excellence more in the instruct- 
ions given us by our Saviour; they were all confirm- 
ed by his own example. Many teachers of mankind 
have been mere teachers of words, and their lives have 
falsified all they said. What a sad course of life : to 
render truth probable by our preaching, and doubtful by 
our practice : to describe the path to heaven on the 
Lord's day, and to tread out the road to hell all the 
week ! Even the best of men have exemplified only a 
part of their doctrine : such are the imperfections of 
the most wise and willing ! But Jesus Christ exempli- 
fied every part of religion. Did he teach piety ? He 
was pious himself, and paid his heavenly Father the first 
and highest adoration. Did he teach us to love our 
neighbours? And who ever carried his love to others 
so far as our Divine Instructer? Did he teach us to 
love ourselves ? He showed us in his own person what 
a wise and well directed self-love is. In short, he nev- 
er did any thing to render his religion suspected ; and 
every action of his life tended to establish it. His vile 
disciple, Judas, who betrayed him, and whom he kept 
in his family perhaps for the sake of submitting his most 
private actions to examination, Judas, I say, hanged 
himself for betraying innocent blood. It is the privi- 
lege of Jesus Christ alone to stand up, and say " Which 
of you," friends or enemies, you strangers, or you of my 
own family, — ''which of you convioceth me of sin?" 



130 JESUS CHRIST 

Blessed Lord ! Far be it from us to blame any one action 
of thy life ! We admire the whole, we subscribe to th(* 
description of one, who thoroughly knew thee, and say 
with him, Thou art " the only-begotten of the Father, 
full of grace and truth :" full of truth, and endowed 
with the most graceful manner of uttering it. No, " nev- 
er man spake like this man." 

Sum up all these excellences ; a perfect knowledge of 
all truth in every part ; a wise choice of such truths, 
and such parts of truths as were proper to constitute 
a religion tit for this world ; a clear manner of stating 
them so as to carry conviction to the understanding, 
and to obtain assent and belief; an affecting colour- 
ing, natural, beautiful, and pathetic, engaging all the 
emotions of the heart in the service of truth; an exam- 
ple showing religion alive in real actions of every kind 
of holiness, of piety towards God, purity in self, and love 
to all mankind, — and allow Jesus Christ the honour due 
to his merit, that he was the first and m.ost excellent of 
all teachers, and that " never man spake like this man." 

Consider the dignity and duration of his doctrine. 
Spoken only in the little kingdom of Judea, it hathr 
sounded through all parts of the world ; and thousands 
living and dying have reported it, and set their seal to 
the truth and goodness of it. It hath not been support- 
ed in the world by arms or artifice, learning or wealth : 
but it hath stood where a religion ought to stand, in the 
convictions and consciences of mankind ; and so forcible 
hath it been, that it hath withstood all the attacks of 
learning and ignorance, riches and cruelty, the malice of 
its enemies, and the unguarded injuries of its friends. 
How many ignorant minds hath it enlightened ! How 
many hard hearts hath it softened ! How many daring 
rebels hath it subdued ! How many wicked thoughts 
hath it prevented from growing into actions ! How ma- 
ny tears of repentance, how many holy resolutions, 
how many just and charitable actions, how many exer- 
cises of piety, how many holy lives, and happy deaths 
hath it produced ! Were the effects of his doctrine sus- 
pended only for one day, how many would spend that 
one day in crying, ^' Return, Lord, unto the many 



THE MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS^ 131 

thousands of Israel V What am 1 saying, one day ? I 
venture to affirm that of the doctrine of Christ, which 
the Scripture says of the air, "- If he gather unto him- 
self his spirit and his breath, in a moment shall they die, 
all flesh shall perish together, and man shall turn again 
unto dust." 

My brethren, the day will come, in which Jesus 
Christ will, so to speak, " gather up his breath and his 
spirit," call again for the Bible he lent 3^ou, and in^- 
quire what use you made of it. I hope you will not 
say as the unjust Jews did, " God forbid." Our Lord 
was one day teaching the people in the temple ; and 
the chief priests, and the scribes, and the elders were 
present. He told them in a parable, which they well 
understood, that they were tenants to God for a well 
planted vineyard, and that justice required they should 
pay their rent : but that, instead of doing this, they 
wounded and shamefully treated the servants of their 
Lord, who were sent to demand it ; and when he sent 
his son on the same errand they murdered him. To 
which he added this question, '' What therefore shall the 
Lord of the vinej^ard do unto them?" And as they 
made no answer, he assured them, " the Lord of the 
vineyard shall come and destroy these husbandmen, and 
shall give the vineyard to others." When they heard 
this they cried, " God forbid !" Forbid what? Would 
you, priests, murder the son of God, and not be tried 
for the crime ? Would you, scribes, read and write 
over the contract between the Lord and his tenants, and 
know the profits of the vineyard to be immense, and the 
rent to be small and easy, — would you abuse the produce 
and pay no rent, and insult your Lord, and after all not 
be called to an account ? And you, grey-headed elders, 
where is your gravity, and wisdom, and justice, where 
are all the laws and rules of court, by which you judge 
your fellow-creatures? would you be above law, and set 
the law-giver of the world at defiance ? God forbid 
justice should not be done ! God forbid there should be 
no difference between " him that sweareth, and him that 
feareth an oath! " " If the foundations," the first principles 



132 JESUS CHRIST 

of all order and government, "^^be destroj'^ed, what can the 
righteous do ?" No, do not say, " God forbid ;*' but rath- 
er sav, "Thy kingdom come ! Come, Lord Jesus, come 
quickly !" Weigh this well, before you put up a prayer 
so dangerous to some people. Do you know what an- 
swer Jesus Christ makes to this prayer? He confirms 
what was just now said to you, that when he comes he 
will call for an account of the book he lent you. Hear 
"him. " Behold, I come quickly ; blessed is he that 
keepeth the sayings of this book. For I testify unto 
every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of 
this book, if any man shall add unto these things, God 
shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this 
book : and if any man shall take away from the words 
of this book, God shall take away his part out of the 
book of life, and out of the holy city and from the things 
which are written in this book." 

Let us conclude by establishing the wisdom and good- 
ness of this last declaration, in substance an answer of 
the prayers of good men, and as applicable to all other 
inspired books as to that of the Revelation of John, to 
which it is affixed. In order to this we will apply the 
subject to two characters. 

Can any thing sufficiently expose the folly of such 
as would either increase, or diminish the Gospel of Je- 
sus Christ ? Suppose 1 should say to you. Good peo- 
ple, in the course of my ministry, I perceive I give jo\i 
oifence ; I am determined to do so no more ; and in or- 
der to give you a full proof of my sincerity, I will in 
future sit one hour before preaching in the cottage just 
by the barn, and receive your instructions in writing. 
If you would have me not preach any part of the Gos- 
pel, signify that part, and if you would have me mix 
with the Gospel any thing to suit your disposition, 
only speak the word, and it shall done. If a people 
could be found so sill}', and so wicked, what a col- 
lection of notes should I have ! One would be, Sir, 
I beg you would not speak against covetousuess : it 
will oifend me. Another would be. You are desired to 
say nothing against slander : it is the pleasure of my 
life. A third would be, Pray, preach notiiing but the 



yn^ MOST EXCELLENT OF ALL TEACHERS. 133 

terrors of the law ; and a fourth, Please to dwell wholly 
on the promises of grace, and say nothing about duty. 
One would say, Mix a little personal abuse with the 
Gospel, and rage and rail at my enemy ; my pleasure ris- 
es with his pain. Although nobody is so lost to shame as 
to speak thus, and to say to a teacher of religion. Pray 
flatter my sins, and make me " twofold more a child of 
hell than before," yet almost all love to have it so : but at 
this rate what of the Gospel should we have left ? As it 
is, it is the wisdom of God, and the power of God ; and 
though it be a " stumbling block to the Jews, and fool- 
ishness to the Greeks," yet it is that by which " it 
pleaseth God to save them that believe." Let us re- 
nounce such idle dreams and let us " search the Scrip- 
tures, for in them we have eternal life, and they are 
are they which testify of Jesus Christ." Let it never 
be said of any of us, " Ye have not his word abiding 
in you." Bold undertaking ! Burn the old Gospel of 
Jesus Christ, it is too hard or too easy, too holy or 
too patient, too zealous or too cool, or too some- 
thing, that does not suit the taste of the world ; and let 
me compose and publish a new Gospel, with a God but 
without a law, with a Saviour but without a cross, with 
a heaven but without a narrow way to it ! Bold and 
daring rebel ! Who are you ? The whole world shall 
rise up against you ; you shall not leave out such essen- 
tial parts, you shall not add, or diminish one word, one 
jot, or one tittle, till all be fulfilled : and " whoso- 
ever shall break one of the least commandments, and 
shall teach men so, he shall be called the least in the 
kingdom of heaven." 

Christians, I address myself to you, to you who " es- 
teemed the word of God more thanyour necessary food." 
Enjoy this evening the pleasure, that this rich subject 
affords. You love your Divine Master, you think, for 
you know by experience, " never man spake like this 
man." You wish others knew the wisdom and good- 
ness of his doctrine^ and especially your near relations. 
You envy Martha, and could you have the honour she 
had of entertaining Jesus Christ in person, you would 
ask him to use his influence with your friends to direct 
12 



^'i^ JESUS CHRIST 

them to their duty : you would say, Lord, "bid my sister 
help me ; dost thou not care that she hath left me to 
serve alone ? " Peace ! careful Martha ! Do not tax thy 
Divine Master with taking- less care of thy sister than 
thou dost. " He careth for thee," he careth for her ; he 
is not " an hireling, who careth not for the sheep," he 
is " the good shepherd, he knoweth his sheep," and all 
his "sheep hear his voice," and follow him. Yes, all 
his sheep hear his voice, and by the wise management 
of teaching a Gospel, and causing it to be written, he 
hath established an universal conversation, and though 
dead, and gone far, far from us, " yet speaketh" by his 
word in all our religious assemblies, in all our houses, 
and in every place where the heavenly instruction 
comes. See, he is this moment speaking terror and 
reproof to that man, in whose ears, by his own fireside, 
one of his children is now reading this passage, " How 
often would I have gathered thy children together, even 
as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and 
you would not." Observe that other wandering sheep 
looking once more toward the fold, from which his rov- 
ing disposition made him stray ; see, he is sitting under 
a tree, and now reading this passage, " Simon, son of 
Jonas, lovest thou me ? Simon, son of Jonas, lovest 
thou me more than thy sins ? " See, his countenance 
changes, he is grieved that his conduct should make his 
love to Christ suspected, he bursts into tears, and saith, 
"'' Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest I love 
thee !" Behold yon distressed family, the man and his 
wiie, and two sons, and three daughters, just returning* 
from burying Isaac, the eldest son, the support and de- 
light of the family. Listen ; the youngest son is now 
reading to the rest, the eleventh chapter of John; Jesus 
saith, " Thy brother shall rise again. I am the resur- 
rection and the life, he that believeth in me, though he 
were dead, yet shall he live ; and whosoever iiveth, 
and believeth in me, shall never die. Believest thou 
this ?" Observe in another house that old disciple just 
at the brink of the grave, now lying in his last illness. 
Mark, his aged companion through life, sitting by his 
bed-side, and with his spectacles reading to him these 



THE MOST EXCELLENT OP ALL TEACHERS. 135 

words, " Let not your heart be troubled : you believe 
in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are 
many mansions ; if it were not so, I would have told you : 
I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and pre- 
pare a place for you, I will come again, and receive 
you unto myself, that where I am, there ye may be al- 
so." O wise and judicious management ! O incompar- 
able gift of tongues, lent and distributed aivhile at Pen- 
tecost, but resting now forever on the head of the 
church, speaking to the dwellers in Asia, Egypt, Rome, 
and all other places, and obliging all to say, " Never 
man spake like this man." 

Before we part, let us see whether a Christian be able 
to answer the objections made by the Pharisees against 
our most excellent instructer. Say they, " Have any of 
of the rulers believed on him ?" We reply. Yes, Nico- 
demus hath, and so hath Joseph of Arimathea : but what 
if they had not ? Are rulers always the wisest and the 
best of men ? Do they of all men spend most time in 
examining religion ? Are they infallible guides in reli- 
gion, and do truth and virtue stand in absolute need of 
their approbation to be or not to be ? Have they the 
Scriptures of the Prophets ? So have we. Have they 
understanding ? So have we. Have we a Master in 
heaven ? So have they. Dare they impartially exam- 
ine every part of religion ? We dare do more : we 
dare follow our convictions to prison, and to death. But 
the Pharisees do not believe on him ! O ! the Phari- 
sees of all men ! " Blind hypocrites, full of all unclean- 
ness and iniquity," shedders of the blood, and builders 
of the tombs of the prophets ! The object of a Phari- 
see's hatred stands on that account recommended to 
good men. But the common people, who follow Christ, 
'' know not the law, and are cursed !" No, they are 
not cursed for their poverty. Is the God of the whole 
earth the God of the rich only ? Why should they not 
know the law ? The laws of religion are plain and 
easy, and the poor do know the law, and make it the 
rule of all their actions. You, poor people ! Go home, 
and by a holy life wipe off this cruel slander cast upon 
you. No, you are not cursed, and doomed to be igno- 



136 JESUS CHRIST, kc. 

rant. If the. di(=iciples of Moses could understand and 
practise the religion he taught them, how much more 
reason have we to expect that you should understand 
and practise the religion of Jesus Christ ; for " never 
man spake like this man," whose disciples you profess 
yourselves to be. May God grant you this grace ! To 
him be honour and "'lory forever. Amen. 



DISCOURSE YIII. 

THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST OBTAINED THE REMlSSIO?i 
OF SINS. 

[AT HAUSTOJs''.^ 



HEBREWS ix. 22. 

Without shedding of blood is no remission. 

Blood ! . . . shedding of blood ! . . . my soul recoils t\t 
the thought, and the feelings of a man, the reason of 
the whole world, and the dictates of religion justify me 
for shrinking, and " stopping my ears from hearing of 
blood." Peace be with the worst enemy I have in the 
world ! Precious may his blood be in the sight of all 
mankind ! A tender heart feels pain at the shedding 
of the blood of animals, and it was to nourish this ten- 
derness, that one of the earliest commandments given 
to the world from heaven was, " You shall not eat 
blood," that is, the blood of animals ; and " whoso shed- 
deth man's blood, by man shall his blood be shed." So 
sacred was the blood of man held, that God would not 
forgive a beast for shedding it ; but required it to be 
slain ; " I will require your blood at the hand of every 
man, and at the hand of every beast." These laws 
given to Noah were incorporated by Moses into his 
laws, and speak nothing but the sense of all mankind. 
Many, very many laws have been made to guard the 
lives of mankind, and some few to take away the lives 
12* 



138 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

of such bloody men as would not suffer others to live in 
quiet ; and there have been too many instances in this 
wretched world of shedding innocent blood : but if rea- 
son and Scripture unite to inspire us with pain at the 
shedding of man's blood, what horror doth it not excite 
in us at the shedding of the blood of an innocent man ! 
When Jonah was thrown overboard, at his own request, 
to perish in a great tempest raised for his sake, even 
the sailors, who are not the most religious of mankind, 
prayed and said, We beseech thee, O Lord, " lay not 
upon us innocent blood !" Even Judas, that shame to 
human nature, could not bear the thought of his having 
betrayed innocent blood : but cast down the price, " and 
departed, and went and hanged himself" 

Where then are we to-day ? Here is Moses with the 
blood of calves and goats sprinkling '' the tabernacle, 
the vessels, the book of the law, and all the people, and 
saying, This is the blood of the covenant which God 
hath made with you." If Moses uses blood, in religion, 
surel}^ there must be a necessity for it ; for Moses was 
a great character, and respect for the man obliges us 
at least to examine what reason he assigns for a prac- 
tice, which must give pain to a man of his mild temper. 
" The man Moses was very meek, above all the men 
which were upon the face of the earth," and on this ac- 
count we admire the prudence of his father-in-law for 
setting him to •'• keep his flock." Moses does not pre- 
tend to institute shedding of blood to gratify his own 
temper; he does not even pretend to do it, either to of- 
fend the Egyptians, or to piease the Jews : but he pre- 
tends to have the express command of God, and to kill 
by authority from heaven. 
^ What the inspired writers of the New Testament tell 
us of this subject, is more astonishing still. They not 
only commend the fidelity of Moses, but the}^ inform us 
that the blood-shedding instituted by him was a " ne- 
cessary pattern," and that the pattern was copied exactly 
by a better person, who shed " his own blood," and 
that by so doing he " obtained eternal redemption for 
us," freeing us by his death, not only from an oljligation 
to offer sacrifices, but also from sin and punishment due 



OBTAINED TSE REMISSION OF SINS. 1 39 

lo it. Hence they attribute many benefits to the death 
of Christ, and, to use an expression of Jesus Christ, 
"eat the flesh and drink the blood" of this innocent suf- 
ferer. One saith, " The blood of Christ cleanseth us 
from all sin." Another saith, " He made peace through 
the blood of his cross." All the saints in heaven sing, 
" Thou hast redeemed us to God by thy blood ; glory be 
unto thee forever and ever." 

A subject, that comes so recommended to us, demands 
the most reverent and modest examination. I tremble 
at opening a book first given to the world besprinkled 
with blood, and I think I hear over again the voice 
calling out of the midst of the bush, and saying, " Moses, 
Moses, draw not too nigh, put off thy shoes from off thy 
feet : I am God." Let us draw nigh enough to God to 
hear what he says : but let us not draw nigh enough to 
be burnt alive. Let us lay aside the extravagant folly 
of supposing that even God can s<ij nothing of himself 
beyond what we understand ; and that nothing ought to 
be done in approaching him but what is fit to be done 
by one mortal when he solicits the friendship of another 
worm like himself. '' O God of peace ! who didst bring 
again from the dead our Lord Jesus, that great shep- 
herd of the sheep, through the blood of the everlasting 
covenant, make us perfect in every good work to do 
thy will, working in us that which is well-pleasing in 
thy sight, through Jesus Christ ; to whom be glory for- 
ever and ever. Amen." 

Without shedding of blood there was no abatement 
according to the law ; and without shedding of blood 
there is no forgiveness according to the Gospel. Let 
us enter on this subject with two cautions. First, let 
us observe, that this subject is one of pure revelation, 
and all we know of it is what we are told by men ap- 
pointed by God to inform us. This is not, like some 
other subjects, a doctrine, the first principles of which 
may be discovered by the mere exercise of sense and 
reason, and which Scripture allows, amends, and im- 
proves : but the whole of it is revealed, and to exam- 
ine this revelation, and reason from it as well as we can, 
is all ouF auty. ^ 



140 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

Secondly, let us take care not to forestall the Inspired 
Writers, by seizing their general notion of the death of 
Christ, and supposing several absurd things about it, 
which they never thought of. It would be easy at this 
rate to make a monstrous errour of a scripture truth ; 
as for example, were we to suppose that God was out 
of temper with mankind, and that Jesus Christ brought 
him to good humour by offering to shed his blood ; or 
that God was a cruel being, who delighted in human 
blood ; or that Jesus Christ died to save his disciples 
the trouble of being holy. Such notions some unthink- 
ing people have entertained, perhaps from their own 
negligence, and perhaps too from the wild way in which 
some rash teachers, more zealous than wise, have treat- 
ed of this awful subject : a subject which demands, both 
in speakers and hearers, the utmost caution, gravity, and 
seriousness. Were I to give you one general rule for 
expounding subjects of pure revelation, I would say, ex- 
plain the doctrine by itself, the principle by the prac- 
tice, the practice by the principle, the cause by its ef- 
fects, the effects by their cause ; and never expound an 
article of pure revelation by your own tempers, good or 
bad. A very good tempered man is apt to think God 
must be like him, and therefore must forgive offences 
without requiring any sacrifice to the honour of his jus- 
tice. An ill-tempered man is apt to think, Jesus Christ 
suffered in consequence of a barbarousness in God, some- 
thing like what he feels when his temper is roused and 
savage. Let us be sober, my brethren ; let us not ex- 
pound the wisdom of God by our own folly, and say, I 
would have done so and so, and therefore God should 
have done so and so, and if he hath not done so, then I 
doubt whether he hath done right. 

I am going to explain this doctrine, that the death of 
Jesus Christ obtained the remission of sin, a doctrine of 
pure revelation, and expressly contained in the text ; and 
I am going to endeavour to teach you how to expound 
this doctrine by its own principles. If we allow the 
foundation truths, we cannot deny this doctrine, which is 
built on them, and which is so full of practical goodness. 
Lend me your attention, exercise your own understand- 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 141 

ings, and I will not despair of making this subject suffi- 
ciently clear to answer the end, for which it is taught. 
That end is expressed in these words, " Ye were not 
redeenaed from your vain conversation with corruptible 
things, as silver and gold : but with the precious blood 
of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot : 
who verily was raised up from the dead, that your faith 
and hope might be in God." 

It is a first scripture truth, that there is a natural and 
necessary difference between just and unjust^ right and 
wrong, good and evil. I call this a truth of Scrip- 
ture, not because the declaration of God creates this dif- 
ference, making by his command an action just or unjust, 
which without that command would have had no quali- 
ties of right or wrong, but because the Scripture al- 
lows, amends, and improves that sense of right and 
wrong, which all mankind without Scripture are forced 
by their own feelings to avow. The apostle Paul speaks 
of this subject in the second chapter of Romans, and 
says, " The Gentiles who have not the written law, do 
by nature the things contained in the law ; these, having 
not the law, are a law unto themselves : which shew 
the work of the law written in their hearts, their con- 
science also bearing witness, and their thoughts the 
mean while accusing, or else excusing one another." 
This is one of the finest passages of Scripture on this 
subject : let us not pass it over lightly. The apostle 
speaks of a law of nature^ that is a role of action rising 
out of the very being of man, so that because he is what 
he is, and as. long as he is what he is, a man, he must 
necessarily have in himself, go where he will, do what 
he will, this rule of acting. The apostle tells us fur- 
ther, where this law is ; it is in the heart ; that is, in our 
secret thoughts : and moreover, he informs us .how our 
thoughts move in regard to our actions. One thought 
excuses another thought, and a second thought accuses 
a first thought, contending together, as if ten just men 
were disputing with ten unjust men ; ten patient men 
against ten passionate men ; ten wise and honest men 
setting ten foolish men right. The heart is in this case 
like a court ; if ignorance or presumption sit to judge, 



142 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

the law will be for sin; but if reason and religion judge, 
the law of righteousness will sway the heart and guide 
the life: but take which we will, our actions do not al- 
ter the nature of things, right is right, and wrong is 
wrong, let what will come of us. Which of you does 
not know the truth of all this without my giving you 
any examples to explain it! Remember then there 
is a difference between just and unjust, right and wrong ; 
and that when one of the speakers in that dialogue in 
Scripture, which we call the book of Ecclesiastes, says, 
" As is the good, so is the sinner, and he that sweareth 
as he that feareth an oath ; no man knoweth either love 
or hatred by all that is before him ;" it is a profane 
wretch disputing against Solomon, who says so. 

Another principle, or foundation truth, like the for- 
mer is, that all men have sinned^ and that there is 
none righteous, no not one. There are as many de- 
grees of sin as there are of size and sense : but in some 
degree all have sinned ; to use the language of David, 
''All have gone aside;" or that of the apostle Paul, 
" All have sinned, and come short of the glory of God." 
By the glory of God he means the rule of right, for ho- 
liness, or always doing what is just and right, is the glo- 
ry of God, as doing what is right is the glory of man, 
and doing wrong, his shame. Where is the happy man, 
who can stand up and say, I never did, in all the course 
of my life, any one action, which I ought not to have 
done. 1 have been as good in every instance as I think 
I ought to have been. I have discharged every exer- 
cise of piety towards God, every duty towards my fel- 
low-creatures, and myself, in every instance, with so 
much integrity and cheerfulness, that I have nothing, 
no, nothing to repent of. I have been humble in pros- 
perity, patient in adversity, diligent in business, fervent 
in spirit, serving the Lord. I am every moment, and 
always have been, ready to die. I ask no favour, I ap- 
proach my Judge without any misgiving or fear, and 
while others say, " God be merciful to us sinners," I 
shall say, " God, I thank thee that I am not as other 
men are." No, my brethren, you are not of this num- 
ber, and you know^ were you to pretend to this, you 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 143 

would find some of your friends, as well as your ene- 
mies, contradict you. One would say, " I have surely 
heard Ephraim bemoaning himself thus, I was a bullock 
unaccustomed to the yoke." Another would cry, " How 
canst thou say, I am not polluted ; see thy way in the 
valley !" In the absence of these, thine own conscience 
would make thee acknowledge, " I have sinned against 
the Lord, and thus and thus have 1 done." Yea, were 
thy conscience asleep, the voice that raises the dead 
would cry, " When thou wast under the fig-tree, I saw 
thee!" 

This leads us to a third principle, that is, that God 
seeth all the thoughts and actions of men. I question 
whether I could propose any truth, which would be so 
readily granted, and so little understood. Who doubts 
whether God knoweth his thoughts and actions ? No- 
body. Who understands the knowledge of God to be in 
constant harmony with all his other perfections ? Very 
few. Let me aspire at the honour of increasing the 
number this evening by teaching you to think justly on 
this subject. Should I inform you that somebody had 
seen a man stab your brother, you would understand no- 
thing but a bare seeing the crime committed : but should 
I tell you that the man who saw the murder done was 
your father, you would understand something more than 
seeing, and you would know, without being told, that it 
was impossible for him to see this bloody action without 
disapprobation and horror ; and you would suppose his 
horror, rising out of a sense of the injustice of the ac- 
tion, would incline him to follow the law, and bring the 
guilty wretch to public punishment. Sanctify this 
thought by applying as much of it to our Father in hea- 
ven, as agrees with the eminence of his perfections. 
He beholds all the children of men, their " down-sit- 
ting, their up-rising, their thoughts afar off." " He com- 
passeth their path all day, and their bed at night, and 
is acquainted with all their ways. He besets them be- 
hind and before, and there is not a word in their tongues, 
but, lo, he knoweth it altogether : he sees if there be 
any wicked way in them." God doth see the actions of 
men, and he knows what he sees: he never mistakes a 



144 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

sin for a virtue, and he knows what degree of guilt is in 
every action : hence it is said, " The Lord is a God of 
knowledge, and by him actions are weighed. -Thou, 
most upright, dost weigh the path of the just." God 
not only knows justice and injustice when he sees them : 
but as he himself is a just and holy being, he cannot be- 
hold both with indifference to either : " The righteous 
Lord loveth righteousness, but him that loveth violence 
his soul hateth." There is not in God any horror at 
sin like what we feel, for pain is not necessary to his 
love of justice : but there is in him a perfect approba- 
tion of what is right, and an extreme irreconcileable- 
ness to what is wrong. The God who sees, and knows, 
and judges, and approves or disapproves of the actions 
of men, is able to reward the right, and to punish the 
wrong : and his almighty power is at perfect agreement 
with his love of holiness, he must protect right and pun- 
ish wrong. Every man in the world would agree to 
all this, had he not some wicked self-interest in not hav- 
ing impartial justice done. 

Our next principle is, that the present life is not a 
state of rewards and punishments. Some have said, 
that God punishes a iew wicked men here with remark- 
able judgments, lest we should forget he governs the 
world ; and he punishes only a few criminals here, lest 
we should forget a future state of punishments. Per- 
haps this may be true : but I dare never go out of 
Scripture on this principle. Such instances as Judas, 
and Belshazzar, and Pharoah, we allow on the testimony 
of the inspired historians ; but we should be liable to 
rash judgments, and cruel mistakes, were we to walk in 
this dark path without an inspired guide. What we af- 
iirm is, that this is not the general condition of mankind 
here. Our Lord fully settles this doctrine by saying, 
" Suppose ye that the Galileans, whose blood Pilate 
mingled with their sacrifices," or that the " eighteen 
upon whom the tower in Siloam fell, and slew them, 
were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem, or 
above all Galileans? I tell you, nay : I tell you, nay." 
These Galileans sacrificing imperfectly to the true God, 
were not more superstitious than others of their neigh- 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 145 

bours, nor so superstitious as the heathens, who sacri- 
ficed to an idol ; much less were they so wicked as some 
others, who worshipped no God at all. Probably those 
eighteen unfortunate debtors, upon whom the walls of 
their prison fell, were not more in debt than others in 
Jerusalem, nor so guilty as some whose extravagance 
had brought them into debt, and whose arts had enabled 
them to escape justice. This life is a state of trial, and 
the next is the state of rewards and punishments. This 
is the doctrine of Jesus Christ, and on this principle he 
grounds some excellent rules of practice ; as, to avoid 
rash judging, to submit patiently to afflictions, and so on. 
" Judge not, that ye be not judged. Judge not according 
to the appearance." The apostle thoroughly under- 
stood this, when he said, " What have I to do to judge 
them that are without ? With me it is a very small 
thing, that I should be judged of you, or of man's judg- 
ment : yea, I judge not mine own self, for I know no- 
thing by myself: but he that judge th me is the Lord. 
Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the 
Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden 
things of dcirkness, and will make manifest the counsels 
of the hearts." 

Here we are come to a difficulty. There is no diffi- 
culty in regard to the wicked, for as soon as they die 
they go to a prison ; at the resurrection of the dead 
they will be brought out to take their trial ; and after 
that they will be punished, each according as his in- 
iquities deserve. Then will be " tribulation and anguish 
upon every soul of man that hath done evil." " As ma- 
ny as have sinned without a written law, shall perish 
without a written law : and as many as have sinned 
against a written law, shall be judged by that law : for 
the judgment of God is according to truth, and he will 
render to every man according to his own deeds." 
Here is no difficulty ; all is fair, clear, open, and just. 
The difficulty is in the case of others, who, though they 
were once " idolaters, adulterers, thieves, covetous, 
drunkards, revilers, or extortioners, yet inherit the 
kingdom of God." Merciful God ! on what principles 
are these, as deep in guilt as others, admitted to ever- 
13 



116 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

lasting" communion with thee ? Art thou partial, and 
hast thou one law for one thief, and another law for 
another ? That be far from thee ! Is thine abhorrence 
of sin suspended in behalf of these people ? That be 
far from thee ! Thou art " in one mind, and who can 
turn thee ?" Did these people repent and reform, and 
didst thou pity and pardon them ? Pity for the wretch- 
ed is glorious in thee who art so able to help them : 
but is thy pity insensible to thy justice ? These people 
did many unjust things, they have never been in a state 
of rewards and punishments, and therefore they have 
not received the just reward of their actions. 

In regard to the wicked their punishments are abated 
in proportion to the good mixed with the evil : but these 
people escape all punishment, and have entered on a 
happiness as eternal as that of the purest angel in glo- 
ry. Almighty parent ! " Righteous art thou when I 
plead with thee ; yet let me talk with thee of thy judg- 
ments. Behold now, I have taken upon me to speak 
unto the Lord, who am but dust and ashes ! Oh ! let 
not the Lord be angry, and I will speak yet but this 
once." Where, in regard to these people, are " the 
ordinances of justice," rigid, impartial, inflexible jus- 
tice ? 

No doubt, my brethren, many of you can solve this 
difficulty : but how ? Will you say high things of the 
goodness of God ? Do so ; it is impossible you should 
say too much on that delightful subject : yet after all, 
there is no justice done in this case, no punishments in- 
flicted, no rewarding 'according to works. Will you 
say. These people felt much sorrow, and did, after their 
repentance, much good : Alas ! their sorrow was not half 
enough ; it undid nothing that had been done ; they 
should have had innocence, not repentance ; and all the 
good they did, and more than they could do, was due to 
God, and ought to have been done had they never of- 
fended him. Do you say, These people gave their gold 
and their silver, their cattle, vea, themselves to God? 
Alas ! are you so ill-informed as to call these things 
theirs? I hear another voice, saying, " Silver is mine, 
gold is mine, every beast of the forest is mine, the cat- 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 147 

tie upon a thousand hills are mine, the fowls of the 
mountains are mine, all souls are mine, the soul of the 
father is mine, the soul of the son is mine, the world is 
mine, and the fulness thereof" Poor man ! dost thou 
give thy silver, and thy family, and thyself to God? No, 
God is the Creator of thee, and of all thou hast. Thou 
livest upon gifts : but he is an independent being, and 
lives of himself 

Christians, suppose we should go with this difficult 
case to God, and humbly ask him on what principles he 
acts in the salvation of sinners ? I said at first this was 
an article of pure revelation, and we thank God the an- 
swer is given in a thousand declarations of Scripture. 
The text says, "Without shedding of blood is no remis- 
sion." The same chapter tells us, " The blood of Christ 
obtained eternal redemption for us ;" and other passa- 
ges inform us, that '• God was in Christ reconciling the 
world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses to 
them ;" that "He made him sin for us, who knew no 
sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in 
him ;" that " one died for all;" that "by the obedience 
of one, many were made righteous;" that "we were 
reconciled to God by the death of his son ;" that "we 
are justified by his blood, and saved from wrath through 
him ;" that " he his own self bare our sins in his own 
body on the tree :" that " Christ hath once suffered for 
sins, the just for the unjust;" that " the blood of Jesus 
Christ cleanseth us from all sin." Of all these passa- 
ges, and a great number more to the same purpose, we 
make a religious principle, and add it to the former 
truths, as a ground of hope, laid by the love of God for 
hopeless man, whom reason, assisted by Scripture, leads 
from principle to principle, from truth to truth, till, but 
for this, he would fall into deep despair. Despair be 
banished now ! He tha^ hath ears to hear, let him hear. 
" God so loved the world, that he gave his only begot- 
ten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not 
perish, but have everlasting life." 

Collect all the truths we have laid down into one 
point. We said there was such a thing as natural jus- 
tice, a sense of jjght and wrong . . . that all mankind 



I 48 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

have done wrong, and are in a state of injustice . . . 
that God sees and knows, abhors and must punish injus- 
tice . . . that the present life is not a state of punish- 
ment, and that the wicked are punished in a future 
state . . . that some who have been guilty of many crimes 
yet escape punishment, and are made happy in heaven 
. . . and that this forgiveness is effected through the 
great love of God, and through the death of Christ. 
This is the substance of what we have been saying. If 
some deny this truth, if others perplex it, and if others 
abuse it, we are sorry for such things : but " let God be 
true, but every man a liar." 

This doctrine is described in Scripture in plain, prop- 
er, literal terms, which establish the matter of fact ; 
and it is also described by similitudes, or fashions of 
speaking among men, which are intended to explain the 
subject, and to make us more sensibly affected with it. 
I will give you an example of each. 

The apostle Paul says twice expressly, " We have 
redemption through the blood of Christ, even the for- 
giveness of sins." This is a plain declaration of a mat- 
ter of fact, and informs us, that though the crucifixion 
of Christ was a horrible murder committed under forms 
of human justice against all the laws of real justice, yet 
from this death we derive redemption, not merely from 
the yoke of Jewish ceremonies, and heathen supersti- 
tion, but a release from punishment due to us for sin : 
'• We have redemption through his blood," one princi- 
pal part of which is the " forgiveness of sins." There 
is a multitude of passages of this sort, and your discern- 
ment will make proper inferences from them in the 
course of your reading the Holy Scriptures. 

To give an example of the other sort. The apostles 
Peter and Paul both call the blood of Christ, the '' blood 
of sprinkling." The first says, " Peace be multiplied 
imto you through the sprinkling of the blood of Jesus 
Christ." The other says, " Ye are come unto the blood 
of sprinkling, that speaketh better things than that of 
Abel." This is a fashion of speaking taken from the 
Old Testament, where blood was not only shed, but 
taken into a bason, and sprinked on the altar, and QU 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 149 

the people, and the apostle explains himself by saying, 
"If the blood of bulls, and the ashes of an heifer sprink- 
ling the unclean, purified the flesh, how much more 
shall the blood of Christ purify your conscience from 
dead works to serve the living God ?" The case was 
this. It was thought necessary for many prudent pur- 
poses to distinguish people, who touched the dead, and 
to require them by some public token to avow the fact. 
It was guarding the lives and properties of all the peo- 
ple. Such an end is answered among us by tolling a 
bell, which gives the whole parish notice that the state 
hath lost a member, and any may inquire whether un- 
fair practices were used to deprive him of life ; that 
house, or land, or something is fallen to an heir, who is 
hereby summoned to make his appearance, and put in 
his claim. Among the Jews, a man having touched the 
dead was obliged to separate himself from his family for 
seven days, and during that time he was called unclean, 
not fit for company, or to appear in public. At the end 
of this time the person was freed from uncleanness by be- 
ing sprinkled with water mixed with the ashes of a heifer 
that had been burnt. It is to this ceremony that the 
apostle alludes, and his reasoning is as much as to say, 
if a Jew derived from his ceremonies of religion the 
benefit of going boldly to worship God, and to exchange 
solitude for good compan}'^, in which he might enjoy 
himself, how much more should you. Christians, enjoy 
yourselves, your friends, and your God, since your reli- 
gion sets forth a Saviour, who died to procure all these 
advantages for you. If their general sacrifices were 
applied to individuals, and brought home to personal 
use, so are the great events, that constitute your reli- 
gion, and particularly the death of Christ, from which 
all Christians derive personal advantages. In this gen- 
eral likeness you may accommodate all the similitudes 
(I cannot think of a plainer word : but if there be any 
word you do not fully understand, come into the house 
to me after I have done, and I will try to explain my 
self), I sa}'^, in this general manner explain to yourselves 
the similitudes, and allusions of Scripture, which relate 
to the benefits we derive from the death of Christ, but 
13* 



150 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

by no means attempt to spiritualize particulars, for it ii 
childish, and will lead you into gross error. 

Consider all the sacrifices of the Jews and Patriarchs, 
as the apostle Paul hath taught you, as figures, or pat- 
terns of heavenly things ; as for example : the high- 
priest was the chief person in the Jewish religion, and 
the whole worship of God was under his care ; Jesus 
Christ is the chief in the Christian church, and the 
Christian religion is under his care. The Jews wor- 
shipped God with bloody sacrifices ; Christians approach 
God through the death of Christ. The high-priest 
prayed to God in a part of the temple separated from 
the rest by a thick hanging of tapestry, called the 
Holy Place, into which he went once a year with blood ; 
Jesus Christ died covered with his own blood, and when 
he rose from the dead, he ascended to heaven, and ac- 
cording to his promise prayed the Father to send anoth- 
er Comforter, the Spirit of Truth, to abide with his 
church for ever. In this manner the apostle recom- 
mends the Christian religion to the Jews, and perhaps 
the Epistle to the Hebrews was written chiefly for the 
use of that people, when they shall in some future time, 
according to prophecy, look favourably upon him v/hom 
their forefathers pierced. The apostle strives to con- 
vince his readers of the excellence of the Christian reli- 
gion above that of the Jews, and consequently above 
that of every other nation. The chief person of that 
religion was a man ; our chief is God : they had a suc- 
cession; our chief hath no successor: their religion 
was for a time ; ours is for ever : their worship was by 
repeated sacrifices ; our approach to God is a benefit 
flowing forever from that one event, the death of Christ : 
their religion stood in performing ceremonies ; ours in 
informing the mind, improving the heart, and amending 
the life : their religion was for themselves ; ours is for 
every body ; for " Christ, by the grace of, God, tasted 
death for every man." 

There are some similitudes of this subject taken in 
Scripture from history, and other occurrences of common 
life, as well as from the religion of the Jews. Jesus 
Christ calls his crucifixion, '' giving his life a ransom 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 151 

for many." A ransom is a price paid to the conqueror 
for the release of a prisoner of war. Jesus Christ likens 
the forgiveness of sin to a release from an obligation to 
pay a debt. These similitudes ought to be soberly ex- 
plained, because some are intended to set forth some of 
the benefits of Christ's death, and others other benefits ; 
for there is no one action in the world, or ever was, 
that can fully express all the benefits of that great event. 
Certainly our Divine Master intended we should always 
keep in memory this event, because he appointed bread 
and wine to be publicly eaten and drunk by his follow- 
ers in their religious assemblies in remembrance of his 
death till his second coming. 

Let us finish by examining some of the benefits, which 
we derive from the death of Christ. Here w^e study, 
and here we learn the true and real character of God^ 
particularly his unyielding justice, and his unbounded 
love. God made the world a noble present, when he 
created wheat ; a nobler still when he made the sun : 
but when he gave the world a Saviour, he unfolded his 
goodness in a manner beyond all our expectations. Man 
had abused his wheat, and his sun, his light, and his rea- 
son, and all his other gifts : but this gift shall express 
his justice, as fully as his love, to prevent abuse of good- 
ness. Will Jesus Christ stoop to become the friend and 
instructer of man ? Must he to this purpose be born 
and live among men ? He must die too, and befriend 
man at the expense of his life. Jesus Christ had the 
highest reason to rejoice at the approach of death, yet 
he was in agony at the prospect of it, because the bit- 
terness of death due to sinners was felt by him instead 
of sinners. We said, some time ago, that the punish- 
ment of sin was so necessary to a Holy God, that it 
could not be dispensed with : but remember, God is as 
great and good as he is just, and in virtue of either his 
prerogative as the first of beings, or his love as the best 
of beings, he might choose either to punish sin in the 
person of the sinner, or in the person of another, whom 
all parties would agree without any loss, and with great 
advantage, to put in the place of sinners. The death 
of Christ then, as it regards God, is to be considered as' 



152 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

a free and bright display of the goodness, the justice, 
the greatness, the holiness, the condescension of God. 

The death of Christ gives us the highest esteem for 
his own character. He appears eminently in this as 
" the image of the invisible God." What cool and wise 
knowledge o.f the whole case before him, the honour of 
God, the worth of himself, the necessities of men, the 
horror of losing souls, the pleasure of saving them, the 
stamping of the image of God deep, clear, and for ever, 
upon the souls of men ! How prudent, patient, mild, 
and even, were all his steps through life up to the cross ! 
How generous and disinterested, how far beyond all 
that we call largeness of heart was it to stoop to die, 
were it only to teach us how to die ! How doth his 
love of justice shine ; others have been praised for ex- 
ecuting justice upon offenders, and praiseworthy it is to 
administer justice to any : but to give up his own just 
right to live, in order to obtain a right for the unjust to 
live to repent and be happy, '' behold, what manner of 
love is this !" If it be a benefit to know such a pattern 
of holiness as Christ, it is a benefit derived from his 
death. Love of Jonathan to David! Tears of Rachel 
weeping for her children ! Esteem of Abraham for 
Isaac ! Feelings of David for Absalom, crying, " O my 
son, my son, would to God I had died for thee !" — de- 
part, you are only worth my attention in the absence of 
this " Lamb in the midst of the throne." " Herein is 
love, not that we loved God, but that he loved us, and 
sent his son to be the propitiation for our sins !" 

In the death of Christ we see the nature of sin^ how 
horrible, and passing all belief it is. It hath been said, 
if goodness should take a mortal shape, and live among 
mankind, all mankind would respect it. Alas ! how lit- 
tle we know mankind! How little we think what one 
single seed of sin is capable of producing ! The sinner 
"■ flattereth himself in his own eyes, until his iniquity be 
found to be hateful," which he doth not know till he 
has practised it some time, and then the consequences 
appear worse than he imagined. When Elisha looked 
steadfastly in the face of Hazael, then only an officer in 
the army of the king of Syria, he blushed and wept. 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 1 53 

Hazael said, " Why weepeth my Lord ?" The prophet 
answered, Because 1 know " thou will set the strong 
holds of my country on fire, sla}^ 3'oung men with the 
sword, dash their children in pieces, and rip up their 
women with child." '•'• What !" cried the captain, " is 
thy servant a dog that he should do this great thing !" 
To which the Prophet mildly replied, " The Lord hath 
shewed me that thou shalt be king over Syria." As if 
he had said, 1 see you are a proud man ; your pride will 
make you an unjust man ; your injustice will make you 
cruel for your own safety ; and your cruelty will make 
you a monster. Accordingly, after he returned, his first 
word was deceit, and his first action quickening the 
death of a dying man : but on he went from crime to 
crime, till, in defiance of all the modesty of a murderer, 
he ript up women with child. Before the coming of 
Christ we knew, man could do a long list of crimes : 
but who would have thought man could have gone so 
far as to affront, and wound, and kill an express image of 
Almighty God ? Goodness, justice, power to give good- 
ness and justice effect, wisdom, and every excellence, 
have taken a mortal shape, and appeared in the " like- 
ness of sinful flesh:" but what is the history of this 
beauty ? It was crucified between two thieves without 
the gates of that city, where only God was known, and 
where, if in any part of the world, perfect innocence 
might have expected esteem. Draw near, sinner, who 
flatter yourself that it is not in your power to do this. 
Is not ignorance in your poAver ? Is not envy, and 
pride, and the fear of man in your power ? These were 
the sins that put the Son of God to death. One only 
loved money more than justice, and he sold him : oth- 
ers only loved the praise of men more than the praise 
of God, and they bought him : the officers only did as 
their masters bade them, and they took him, and bound 
him, and struck him : the soldiers only made themselves 
merry with a stranger, and they dressed him in an offi^ 
cer's coat, and mocked him, and crowned him with 
thorns, and called him king, and bent the knee, and spat 
in his face : Pilate only wished to be popular, and he 
adjudged him to die : the thieves only did as other peo- 



1 54 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

pie did, and they reviled him. One of them repented 
and found mercy. God grant, you all may repent, and 
like him find mercy ! Always when you feel pride, or 
envy, or any sin stirring in your heart, you may know 
what it would grow to, if it had time and room, and on 
this account you should always hate the seed for the 
sake of the fruit, and say, I know what you would be at, 
you would poison me, and kill, if it were possible, the 
God that made me. 

In the death of Christ the Christian reads the ^'•for- 
glvenesss of siiis. Sin is nothing to some men, but they 
are ignorant men ; for to one who knows the nature of 
it, it is a poison that drinks up the spirits, and the re- 
membrance of it reduces a bold and cheerful man to a 
low and trembling state. Every thing tends to increase 
the wretchedness of such a man. If he thinks of a great 
God, it is a great God against him : if he thinks of a 
good God, it is a good Father, despised and insulted ; if 
he thinks of the law of right and wrong, he hates him- 
self for having been an enem}'^ to right, and a friend to 
what all good men abhor ; if he thinks of heaven, it is 
a happiness forbidden to him, and guarded like para- 
dise, with a " flaming sword turning every way ;" if he 
thinks of hell, it seems just, but intolerable ; if of his soul, 
it is lost, and if of his body, it must return to the dust, 
and rise at the last day to the '' resurrection of damna- 
tion.^' This man doth not' resemble the raven let out 
of the ark by Noah ; she could alight and feed on the 
floating carcases of the dead. He resembles the dove 
that "found no rest for the sole of her foot." It is not 
a general guess concerning unknown mercy, that can 
satisfy this man ; it is not the glossy surface of his own 
imperfect works, that can calm his conscience ; justice 
sits there, and disdains every impure offering, saj'ing 
la the name of God, " If ye offer the lame and sick, is 
it not evil ?" " Offer it now unto thy governor, will he 
be pleased with thee, or accept thy person, saith the 
Lord of Hosts ?" " Cursed be the deceiver, who hath 
in his flock a male, and voweth and sacriiiceth unto the 
Lord a corrupt thing : for I am a great King, saith the 
Lord of Hosts." '^ Cursed be the man that trusteth iu 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 155 

man, and maketh flesh his arm." Trembling soul, 
afraid and ashamed to look upon God, listen to the voice 
that saith, "•' If any aaan thirst, let him come unto me 
and drink. My blood is drink indeed. Except you 
drink the blood of the Son of Man, you have no life in 
you." " Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, 
hath eternal life, and I will raise him up at the last 
day." Do not say with the captious Jews, " How can 
this man give us his flesh to eat ?" For he hath ex- 
plained his meaning so that you cannot misunderstand 
him, by saying, " He that eateth me shall live by me, 
just as I live by the Father." God the Father is a pure 
Spirit ; he hath no flesh and blood to be eaten and 
drunk : but Jesus Christ lived by believing in his wis- 
dom, goodness, power, and so on. Exactly so in your 
case. There is no flesh and blood of Christ on earth 
for you to eat and drink, " Him the heaven hath receiv- 
ed till the restitution of all things :" but '' this is the 
will of him that sent the Son, that every one who be- 
lieveth on him may have everlasting life." Live then 
the life of faith, and by believing what the Scriptures 
aflirm of the Father, and of the Son of his love, live 
happy till faith is changed into sight in heaven. Then 
in " the general assembly of the first-born," behold 
" God the judge of all," and " Jesus the Mediator of the 
new covenant." Till then " see that you refuse not 
him that speaketh." 

In the death of Christ let us learn how to live. What 
is there in this life which we can call our own, except 
religion ? Have we character ? In this world even in- 
nocence is not safe, for the glory of mankind was " num- 
bered with transgressors." So many people have an in- 
terest, and what is more a pleasure in blasting the repu- 
tation of such as excel, that a good man should learn 
not to overprize even this jewel, for there are times, 
and places, and persons, where scandal is an honour, and 
where it is glorious to say, ^' If this be to be vile, I will yet 
be more vile." Is prosperity desirable ? In this world 
the wicked prosper, and Flerod is a king, Pilate a judge, 
and Caiaphas a priest, in a city where the wise and up- 
right Judge of the world taught among the miserable, 



15(3 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST 

and died among the wicked. The " man of sorrows 
was oppressed and afflicted, and made his grave with 
the wicked." Let us be thankful for prosperity : but 
let us remember it is not always a companion of piety. 
Is health and long life desirable ? Christ was cut off in 
the midst of his days. Health and long life are not the 
chief good, and when it pleases God to deprive us of 
them, we ought to be content. Is friendship desirable 
to sweeten life ? Remember what a friend Judas was 
to Christ ; remember too that when he most needed 
his real friends, they slept while he was in agony, and 
at his death all " forsook him and fled." Let us not set 
our hearts too much on friendship. In this world it is 
sometimes a dangerous, and at all times an uncertain 
thing. Let us live with our friends as Christ did with 
his ; so that a Judas may avow our integrity. In a 
word, let us, like Christ, consider life as a day, religion 
the work of that day ; and let us aspire at the glory of 
saying in the evening of it, " I have finished the work 
which thou gavest me to do ; and now, Holy Father, I 
am no more in the world, but I come to thee." 

Above all, in the death of Christ, let us learn to die. 
O lovely example of a departing soul ! Would to God 
*' my last end may be like thine !" Jesus Christ died 
calm and composed in the midst of a mob, in the full 
exercise of piety to God, pity to the wretched, forgive- 
ness to his enemies, tenderness to his family, with dig- 
nity in himself, and a lesson of instruction to all man- 
kind. My soul ! Perhaps thou wilt not struggle to 
quit thy tabernacle of clay amidst a cursing, reviling, 
gaming, laughing, insensible crowd, dead to all thy feel- 
ings, and alive to nothing but their own brutal passions ; 
but thou wilt, on some bed of thorns, be in agonies to 
depart, thou wilt make the '' keepers of the house trem- 
ble," thou wilt '' darken the sun, the moon, and the 
stars," thou wilt " loose the silver cord, break the gold- 
en bowl, the pitcher at the fountain, the wheel at the 
cistern, return the dust to the earth," and thyself " unto 
God who gave thee !" Would to God thou couldst learn 
of thy Saviour to do all this coolly and calmly ! Why 
shouldst thou flutter ? " Whither thou goest thou know- 



OBTAINED THE REMISSION OF SINS. 157 

est, and the way thou knowest." Say after the great 
Master to Mary, who stands weeping, " Woman, why 
weepest thou ? I ascend unto my Father, and your Fa- 
ther, and to my God, and your God." Jesus Christ died 
in the exercise of piety. The severity of Providence 
did not shock him ; he, unshaken as the rock in the tem- 
pest, called him Father, and said, " Into thy hands I 
commend my spirit." Let us die in an act of adoration, 
and go bowing into the presence of the King of kings, 
our Father and our God. Jesus died in the exercise of 
pity to the wretched thief, who repenting said, " Lord, 
remember me when thou comest into thy kingdom :" 
and he replied, " Verily I say unto thee, to-day shalt 
thou be with me in Paradise." Let us remember the 
wretched when we die, and if we can, let us leave a to- 
ken that we bore their griefs, and carried their sorrows 
in our hearts, even when prudence forbade us to admin- 
ister much relief. Christ died forgiving his enemies, 
and praying his Father to forgive them. Let us do 
likewise, and lest death should take us unawares, let us 
" agree with our adversary quickly." " If thou bring 
thy gift to the altar, and there rememberest that," not 
thine adversary, but " thy brother hath aught against 
thee, leave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy 
way ; first be reconciled to thy brother, and then come 
and offer thy gift." Jesus died full of tenderness for his 
family. There stood by the cross his mother, his aunt, 
Mary Magdalen, and that lovely youth, the apostle John. 
In the hearing of these three Marys, he made his will, 
and knowing that a " sword pierced through the soul" of 
his mother, he provided for her after his death by say- 
ing to John, " Behold thy mother," and to his mother, 
'' Woman, behold thy son : turn thine afflicted eyes from 
this bloody cross, and look for me in that generous young 
man, who, when I am dead will work to support thee, 
and will reverence thy hoary head for my sake. One 
word was enough for such a man as John, and " from 
that hour, he took her unto his own home." O how- 
dreadful are some of the kind offices of life ! To lead 
such a mother home from the execution of such a son, 
how it rends, yet how it heals the heart ! Let us, after 
14 



158 THE DEATH OF JESUS CHRIST, &C. 

the example of our Divine Master, show kindness to 
our fanriilies and friends through life, and a profusion of 
it when we die. Are any of our families like to be 
turned out of doors when we die ? perhaps God will 
provide a John to take them in. We must not take the 
liberty which the Lord of all took, but we may " leave 
our fatherless children to God, he will preserve thera 
alive ;" let us tell our " widows to trust in him.'^ Let 
us learn by the command given to John, how we ought 
to behave to people left in their old age to a wide 
world to struggle at once against poverty and the infir- 
mities of age. If we cannot take them home, yet let 
us never forget the voice that said, " Behold thy moth- 
er ! Behold thy son !" Jesus died in perfect charac- 
ter, a dignity that never left him ; no command about 
the vain show of a funeral, no trifles about the world, no 
dread and despondency about Providence, no reaching 
©ut entails, nothing little, nothing mean ; but like him- 
self, one constant, undiminished excellence of character. 
There was no need of attention to these little things. 
Every thing feels a good man's death, and all that knew 
him are his mourners : but heaven and earth felt and 
trembled at the death of Christ, and the whole world 
have celebrated his praise. Christ died an example of 
dying, and showed mankind how to meet their fate. 
Happy for us if we learn to imitate him, and if after 
•we have shown the world the dignity of a Christian life, 
we are enabled to show them how Christians, whose 
hopes are full of immortality, ought to die. " If we be 
planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall 
be also in the likeness of his resurrection." " If we be 
dead with him, we shall also live with him." "If we 
suffer, we shall also reign with him." " Unto him that 
loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood, 
and hath made us kings and priests unto God and his 
Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and 



DISCOUKSE IX. 

JESUS CHRIST THE GOVERNOP., OF HIS DISCIPLES. 
l^T WHITTLESFORD, before a public Baptism. '\ 

MATTHEW XXiii, 10. 

One is your master^ even Christ. 

It was a custom formerly, in some Christian church- 
es in the eastern part of the world, for people new- 
ly baptized to wear, seven days, white garments, and 
crowns on their heads. They intended to inform their 
neighbours, by their white clothes, that the Christian 
religion was innocent and holy, and by the crowns or 
garlands on their heads, that Christians were advanced 
to dignity. The custom was needless and superstitious ; 
for the ordinances of religion, like the stars in the fir- 
mament, were formed in such perfection, that they are 
not capable of improvement ; and, as one Christian hath 
as much right to alter religion as another, if it were al- 
lowable to alter any thing, it would be allowable to al- 
ter every thing, and to multiply fanciful improvements 
till the religion of Jesus would be entirely lost. It was 
owing to this fahe principle, that formerly our forefa- 
thers in this country worshipped the Virgin Mary and 
the saints, after they had wor>:hipped Jesus Christ, and 
made offerings of money at altars built in the churches 
for the purpose : bat in process of time, the altar of 
Christ went out of fashion ; and when our king Harry 
the Eighth abolished these superstitions, the books of 
the cathedral church at Canterbury proved, that in one 



160 JESUS CHRIST 

year the people had offered above nine hundred and 
iifty pounds to one saint Thomas, a little more than 
four pounds to the Virgin Mary, and to Jesus Christ no- 
thing at all. 

When we trace most errors and superstitions, we 
find they took their rise in some truth ; and though in 
the present case it was superstitious to crown Christians 
newly baptized, yet it is true that the man, who embra- 
ces the Christian religion, does actually rise into dig^ni- 
ty by doing so. The Scripture saith, " Jesus Christ 
makes his disciples kings unto God," that is, he advan- 
ces men from a state of ignorance, to a state of wisdom ; 
from vicious company to virtuous company ; from sla- 
very under sin to a dominion over their own passions ; 
and in this advancement stands the true dignity and glo- 
ry of a Christian. 

It was with a view to raise the apostles to this hon- 
our, that our Lord admonished them in the chapter, out 
of which I have taken the text, to " beware of the 
Pharisees." In one part of his discourse he guards 
them against their cruelty ; in another against their ig- 
norance and hypocrisy ; and in that part to which our 
text belongs, he inculcates humility and brotherly love, 
in opposition to that spirit of pride and dominion, which 
the Pharisees in every thing discovered. They pre- 
tended to know more of religion than others, and took 
the title of Rabbi, master or doctor, and along with 
that, dominion over the faith and practice of the com- 
mon people. " But," says our Lord to his disciples, 
'•be not ye called Rabbi, and call no man your Father 
upon the earth ; for one is your Father, which is in 
heaven, and one is your master, even Christ." This is 
the doctrine which I am going to explain and enforce. 

If you would understand this doctrine, you must take 
care to restrain it to that subject, to which only it be- 
longs, that is, religion. We affirm, that Jesus Christ is 
the governor, and the only governor and director of all 
his disciples : but we mean the governor of the reli- 
gion of his disciples. I will explain myself more at 
large. 

We do not mean that Jesus Christ taught a body of 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 161 

laws of civil government When mankind agree to live 
together in society, it is necessary they should agree to- 
gether on certain rules or laws by which they should 
conduct themselves to one another ; and as all man- 
kind, if they choose to make use of their reason, are able 
to judge what laws are most proper to answer the end 
of their associating together, which is self-preservation, 
so there is no need of a Divine interposition. Our Sav- 
iour never once spoke to his disciples on this subject. 
If the inhabitants of one kingdom choose to submit the 
absolute disposal of their lives, liberties, and properties 
to one person of one family ; if the people of another 
country choose to resign themselves up to twenty fami- 
lies; and if the inhabitants of another part of the world 
choose to keep the disposal of these invaluable bless- 
ings in their own hands ; in all these cases praise is due 
for the exercise of reason, or blame for the disuse of it. 
Christianity is no further concerned with civil govern- 
ment than as it teaches its disciples to make a virtuous 
use of their reason. If men reason virtuously, they 
will be led to accommodate the preservation of them- 
selves to the safety and happiness of their fellow citi- 
zens ; and though Christianity doth not teach a form of 
civil government, yet it doth teach all the virtues that 
are necessary to make men happy in societj^ When, 
therefore we say, Christ is the only governor of his 
disciples, we do not mean to disturb the civil order of 
making and executing human laws for the preservation 
of the lives, and liberties, and properties of mankind. 

Nor do we mean to apply the text to universities^ or 
other academies of literature. We consider learning as 
the embellishment, or, if you will, the clothing of a 
country, and it would be easy to show that our univer- 
sities have informed and adorned ail Europe. Toq 
great praise cannot be given to these learned bodies, 
nor can too much respect be paid to the members of 
them ; for it is owing to their unwearied studies and in- 
defatigable pains, that you are enabled to read a Gos- 
pel in English, which was at first taught in Hebrew and 
Greek. To their learned labors in several arts and sci- 
ences, at a vast expense, and at the hazard of their 
14* 



162 JESUS CHRIST 

lives, you are indebted for that inestimable annual pre- 
sent, an almanack ; a book of more value than the ten 
folio volumes of St. Augustin. Hence you derive phy- 
sicians to administer healing in your sicknesses ; and 
hence, in a word, thousands of improvements in all the 
useful labours of life. The religion taught us by Jesus 
Christ includes no directions on this subject. It doth 
not tell us whether to prefer a private academy, or a 
public foundation ; and much less doth it censure, as 
some of the old Puritans thought, the conferring of de- 
grees in arts and sciences. Religion affects literature 
only as it affects governments, by teaching us a habit 
of virtuous reasoning. 

Further, we do not apply the doctrine of the text to 
public charities^ alms-houses, work-houses, or common 
practices in life. It is not conceivable, that Jesus 
Christ gave any laws for or against medical matters ,* 
as, for example, inoculation, or that he wasted his time, 
and the attention of his hearers about comparative tri- 
fles ; for where reason is sufficient, revelation is unne- 
cessary. In all manner of cases, except in that of the 
direct and immediate worship of God, there is one, and 
but one general law, which may not improperly be ex- 
pressed in these words, " Whatsoever things ar^ true, 
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are 
pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things 
are of good report ; if there be any virtue, if there be 
any praise, think on these things." 

It is to religion, and to religion alone, then, that we 
apply the doctrine of the text, " One is your master, 
even Christ." Jesus Christ taught us a perfect reli- 
gion. It is perfect in its kind, because it is religion, 
and it wants nothing that a religion ought to have : and 
thus our master differs from all teachers in the heathen 
world. It is perfect in degree, because it adapts itself 
to all the conditions of mankind, and herein the Chris- 
tian religion differs from that of the Jews. That of the 
Jews was perfect in kind, for it was all founded on the 
knowledge and fear of God ; but it was not perfect in 
4egree, because it was incumbered with ceremonies, 
and intended only for that nation ; whereas Jesus taught 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 163 

a religion fit " for every creature in all the world." 
Our master believed and practised every part of the 
religion he taught us. ^his religion is practicable by 
us : every doctrine may be understood, and every duty 
performed. Our guide commanded us to follow his ex- 
ample, and rested the proof of our love to him on our 
obedience to his commandments. 

To be more explicit. Let us divide Christianity into 
four parts, the facts, the proofs, the duties, and the mo- 
tives ; and let us examine each of these parts, in order 
to explain what we mean when we call Jesus Christ the 
only governor of the religion of his disciples. 

Observe first, the facts reported in the New Testa 
ment. That there is a God . . . that he takes notice of 
the actions of men . . . that in love to mankind he sent 
his son to instruct them . . . that this illustrious person 
was born as the Prophets had foretold in the reign of 
Herod, at the town of Bethlehem in the country of Ju- 
dah, of a virgin of the family of David . . . that he taught 
a state of future rewards and punishments, and that he 
vehemently exhorted men to seek the first in a course 
of virtue, and to avoid the last by laying aside the prac- 
tice and the love of sin . . . that he himself exemplified 
his doctrine in his own person . . . that he took a few 
men under his immediate tuition, and left them to in- 
struct mankind after his death, promising to give them 
extraordinary assistance . . . that having finished his min- 
istry he was crucified between two thieves ; his virtu- 
ous sufierings being highly acceptable to God, and exceed- 
ingly beneficial to all his followers . . . that three days 
after his crucifixion he rose from the dead, and appear- 
ed to his disciples, and that having given them full in- 
structions what to believe, and how to act, he forty 
days after ascended to heaven, and entered on the en- 
joyment of that honor and happiness, which his merit 
demanded, and which all good men approve. This is a 
set of facts exhibited by our Divine Master in person to 
his disciples, and by them in their writings to us. A 
man, whose understanding is governed, as it ought to 
be, by evidence, examines these facts, admits them to be 
true, and so yields to what I call the sole government of 



164 JESUS CHRIST 

Jesus Christ, in regard to the true authentic history of 
his life. 

To these facts several additions have been made by 
curious Christians in these latter ages ; but it is the be- 
lief of the genuine facts recorded in the New Testa- 
ment, and not a crediting of fanciful additions, that con- 
stitutes a Christian submission to that pure revelation of 
Jesus Christ, which he thought proper to make of himself, 
That he was born, is a fact ; but that he was born in 
December, is an addition. If we be governed by Scrip- 
ture evidence, we shall believe the first ; but if we be 
dissatisfied with the simplicity of revelation, we must 
contend and come to some resolution about the last. 
The Christian, who enters into the spirit of our doc- 
trine, will content himself with the sufficiency of reve- 
lation ; and will believe that if the day of his master's 
birth had been necessary to any good purpose in reli- 
gion, the New Testament would have marked it. We 
will not pursue this thought any further, but we will 
leave you to meditate on this subject of facts and addi- 
tions, hoping and praying that you may hold yourselves 
bound to believe nothing for religion but what is stamp- 
ed with the authority of your Divine Teacher ; for " One 
is your master, even Christ." 

Remark next the proofs of the truth of these facts. 
There are four sorts of proofs, which we have very of- 
ten mentioned, and which we wish to have you so fa- 
miliarly acquainted with, that it would be unnecessary 
to mention them any more. The first are taken from 
Prophecy, or rather from a comparison of the events 
which happen in the world, with what the prophets 
foretold should come to pass. The dispersion of the 
Jews is an event of this kind ; the persecutions of Chris- 
tians is another, and the corruption of Christianity is a 
third. The second sort of proofs are miracles, which 
Christ wrought, and which his bitterest enemies never 
denied, though they were wicked enough to attribute 
them to the devil. A third set of proofs is taken from 
the lives of the writers of the Bible ; and the last from 
the goodness of the doctrine contained in it. The Chris- 
tian who endeavours to support Christianity by tempo- 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 165 

ral rewards and punishments, affects to be wiser than 
his master ; but he, who dares rest his holy religion on 
its own rock, enters into the spirit of the doctrine in our 
text, " One is your master, even Christ." 

Observe the duties of the Christian religion. The 
Gospel is considered both as a revelation of mercy, and 
an obligation to duty ; and if it be the first, gratitude 
^vi\\ allow it must be the last. The duties of a Chris- 
tian are of two sorts. The first are, what are called 
moral, or the duties which we owe to God, to ourselves, 
and to one another, both as creatures and as Christians. 
The other are called positive duties (forgive this tech- 
nical term, I cannot think of another just now), and by 
positive duties we mean Baptism and the Lord's supper, 
which Christ expressly commanded his disciples to ob- 
serve. The Christian who performs both these kinds 
of duties, acts like a Christian, by obeying his Divine 
master ; while he, who incorporates superstitious prac- 
tices into the Christian life, discovers either the arro- 
gance of a master, or the servility of a slave. Either 
he himself hath introduced a performance without the 
authority of his master, or he hath submitted to some 
other person who hath done so. 

Consider the motives of the Christian religion. Our 
heavenly director did something more than laying down 
a plan ; he gave it effect, by including in his scheme of 
happiness such powerful and forcible considerations as 
were sufficient to give actual enjoyment. Had God giv- 
en man a scheme or plan of the heavens, or of the sea, 
or of the earth, or of a single flower^ and no more, man 
would have had a fine speculation ; but he could neith- 
er have made a world nor a violet. Had Christ given 
us only a plan of virtue and happiness, we could never 
have obtained either ; he did this, but he did more ; he 
drew back the veil that hid futurity from our eyes, and 
brought forward to our sight the rising of the dead, the 
coming of the Judge, the happiness of heaven, the mis- 
ery of inextinguishable fire ; or rather, he showed us 
in these facts the true character of Alraignty God, and 
so conveyed that force into his doctrine, which renders 
it irresistible and glorio\:is. The man, who, unacquainted 



186 JESUS CHRIST 

with these gTeat moving powers, endeavours to kee'p 
Christianity alive by a few feeble, worldly maxims, doth 
not enter into the spirit of our text : on the contrary, 
the Christian, filled with these motives, resembles Ma- 
ry, who enjoyed all the power of religion, by only " sit- 
ting at the master''s feet." 

Sum up these articles, and they amount to this. 
Christ, the founder of our holy religion, hath ordered 
as much of his history to be recorded, as it is necessary 
for us to know ; and he hath established the truth of 
the facts on such proofs as he thought most likely to 
support it ; he hath commanded and exemplified all the 
duties necessary to be performed by us ; and he hath given 
us such weighty reasons for performing them, as in his 
judgment were equal to the establishment of knowledge, 
virtue, and happiness. To enter into his views, is to 
receive him for master ; and to refuse every other di- 
rector in matters of religion and conscience, to require 
no more to make a Christian than he required, is to ad- 
mit the meaning of this declaration, " One is your mas- 
ter, even Christ." 

My fellow-citizens ! I cannot sufficiently express the 
feelings of my heart on this occasion. When I survey 
this great company, assembled in this sequestered mead- 
ow, the sun smiling, the air fanning, the blossoms and 
the flowers perfuming, the river running gurgling by, 
and all of us come with perfect ease, a part to be bap- 
tized on their own profession of faith, and the rest to 
attend to the reasons of the practice ; when I behold 
the decent inquisitiveness of many, and know the prin- 
ciples of most, I cannot help congratulating you in the 
borrowed language of the wise man, " Many daughters 
have done virtuously ; but thou excellest them all." 
Allow me to explain myself. 

The Catholic church at Rome " did virtuously," when 
she shook off the authority of heathen emperors in mat- 
ters of religion. Before the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christ, the heathens united the character of high-priest 
with that of king ; so that the religion of heathen coun- 
tries was not directed by the reason of the inhabitants, 
but by the arbitrary orders of an unjust and cruel ty- 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 16T 

rant. The Roman emperors were in possession of this 
prerogative, when Christ was born ; and when the Gos- 
pel was first preached in the provinces of the empire, it 
was supposed to be an invasion of the imperial authori- 
ty. The Gospel, however, was taught at Rome, and 
all Over the empire, which is called in Scripture, " the 
whole world." The Apostles taught the heathens to 
think and act for themselves, and strongly inculcated 
this in their writings. The people did so, and re- 
nouncing the prejudices of their education and the 
superstitions of their country, became Christians on 
their own conviction of the truth and excellence of 
Christianity. Individuals thus converted, formed them- 
selves into little societies, called churches. There 
was one at Philippi, another at Corinth, and another at 
Rome, to all which the Apostle wrote letters of instruc- 
tion, not by authority of the Emperor, but by virtue of 
a commission received from Jesus Christ. The Chris- 
tian church at Rome made no formal declaration of 
rights, but they practically claimed the liberty of re- 
nouncing the Emperor for a master in religion, and re- 
ceiving Jesus Christ. In the reign of mild Emperors, 
they were permitted to live in quiet ; and when cruel 
Emperors persecuted them, they wrote modest apolo- 
gies, persevered in their profession, and sealed their 
profession with their blood. Would you think, my 
brethren, that a people, who had the virtuous courage 
to resist the first of mortals, a Roman Emperor, should 
have the meanness to resign their liberty to one of their 
own teachers, a creature of their own election, who 
was, only because they chose him to be ? ^'So it was, and 
for ages past, to this day, the whole church of Rome, 
consisting of many kingdoms, do not even pretend to 
think for themselves in religion, but, on the contrary, 
avow the infallibility of one single man. The clergy- 
man at Rome, called Pope, that is, papa or father, is to 
them, instead of conviction, instead of conscience, in- 
stead of reason, instead of Scripture, instead of Christ 
himself; and this exchange is called the Holy Catholic 
and Apostolic religion of Jesus Christ. 
The church of England " did virtuously" to shake off 



168 JESUS CHRIST 

the authority of the Bishop of Rome, in matters of reli- 
gion. The history of our country is hardly worth at- 
tention till the reign of Henry the Seventh ; and then it 
seems not to be the country which we now inhabit ; so 
gross was the ignorance, and so very abject was the 
slavery of our ancestors. It was a glorious day, when 
the reformation took place, and when the title of the 
Bishop of Rome to dominion over conscience was fully 
and fairly examined. This was done under many dis- 
advantages, with many imperfections, and at the ex- 
pense of much treasure, and much human blood ; but it 
was done, and it was well and thoroughly done ; and 
Christians once more heard the joyful sound of the text, 
'' Call no man your Father upon earth ; for one is your 
Father, which is in heaven, and one is your master, 
even Christ." To read the first writings of the refor- 
mers, you would suppose they were going directly into 
the spirit and practice of Christian liberty ; but, certain 
it is, they fell short, and vindicated that liberty against 
a foreign Bishop, only to place it in the hands of civil 
governors ; so that, though the Scriptures were restored 
to the people, yet the sense was retained by the crown, 
and expressed in certain articles of faith ; and though 
Christ was reinstated in name, yet he was to be adored 
only as a printed ritual allowed. We grant, this revo- 
lution was a noble amendment ; for the government of 
this country being partly in the hands of the people, 
partakes of popular freedom ; and the prerogative of es- 
tablishing religion is so justly softened with toleration 
in the letter of the law, and with liberality of sentiment 
in the spirit of government, that nobody has any thing 
to fear at present on a religious account in this country. 
You may, if you please, adopt the established faith, and 
you may, if you think proper, renounce it. 

The Protestant dissenters in this country have " done 
virtuously" in not accepting the emoluments which are 
affixed to the established religion, and in following their 
own convictions, without fee or reward. There is no- 
thing so unmanageable as a man's own understanding. 
He opens his ears to religious instruction, and before 
he is aware, truth seats itself ia his mind, and will reign 



THE GOVEE.NOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 169 

there in spite of him. It is not in his power to unlearn 
what he understands ; nor can he choose to believe that 
false, which he knows to be true. If he refuses to act 
according to his convictions, conscience arraigns him, 
and he seems to be tried for his life. He becomes un- 
happy as a condemned criminal, and his conscience will 
admit of no calm, till his conduct corresponds with his 
convictions. What can he do ? The answer is easy. Let 
him act uprightly, and be happy : " One is his master, 
even Christ." When men thus follow their own con- 
victions into a Christian church, there they ought to be 
at peace : but even they cannot be at peace, if any one 
man presumes to require others to think and act as he 
does ; for this would be to exclude Christian liberty, and 
in effect to say. One is your master, even the imposer of 
a creed. They " do virtuouslj'^," who claim Christian 
liberty for themselves ; but they, who along with that 
claim, allow it in its full exercise to all their brethren, 
in their community as well as out of it, they " excel them 
all," 

A doctrine so free from venom, so placid in itself, so 
<ionducive to the virtue and happiness of mankind, so 
full of " mercy and good fruits," so much like the sun 
that " riseth on the evil and the good ;" can such a doc- 
trine come from him, who " was a murderer from the 
beginning ?" Shall we say of a teacher of this doctrine, 
" How sayest thou, ye shall be made free ?" " Say we 
not well, that thou art a Samaritan, and hast a devil ?" 
My God ! what charms do thy children find in bondage ? 
Whence this unnatural shuddering at the sound of free- 
dom? Can it be difficult to inspire the souls of mankind 
with a love of liberty ; their own liberty, the liberty of 
loving and adoring thee according to the dictates of 
their own conscience, conscience, that vice-God upon 
earth ! Well, let us try, let us examine whether the 
sole government of every man's conscience by Jesus 
Christ, in the manner we have been explaining it, hath 
any reasons to support it. 

First then, we affirm, there is no need of an}^ other 
dominion over conscience, than what Jesus Christ exer- 
y^ises, the dominion of argument to support the fact of 
15 



170 JESUS CHRIST 

his mission. If the Gospel were a hard and difficult 
science, it might be beyond the capacities of some of 
our fellow-creatures ; but it is not so. We contend, 
that there is nothing in the Gospel, written by the Evan- 
gelists, necessary to be known in order to salvation, 
which is too hard for any plain man to understand. Let 
any man take the Gospel according to any head of a 
party, for example, according to St. Augustin, which is 
contained in ten great folio volumes, and which is ex- 
pounded by a set of learned men in the church of Rome, 
and let him give every man his own opinion, till there 
remain only the pure texts quoted by them, and written 
by the Evangelists, and he would find himself just where 
I would place him ; that is, in possession of the pure 
Gospel, with as much right, and as much ability to judge 
of its meaning, as all these gentlemen expositors had. 
Should it be said, these scholars inform us that the name 
Jesus comes from the word Joshua; and Joshua from 
another word ; and should they inform us of a thousand 
such things ; we should reply, all these are true, but the 
knowledge of these is not necessary to salvation, and 
therefore is not that Gospel, without the belief of which 
we cannot be saved. In a word, we consider every order 
to believe what other men affirm to be true, exactly 
like an act of Parliament, requiring all the inhabitants 
of Great Britain to wear spectacles, though the far 
greater part of them have good eyes, and no need of 
glasses. When the apostle Peter lay "sleeping be- 
tween two soldiers, bound with two chains, the angel of 
the Lord smote him on the side, and his chains fell off." 
The angel accompanied him through the wards, and 
caused the iron gate to open without Peter's moving a 
finger ; but the same angel ordered him to " gird him- 
self," to " bind on his sandals," and to " cast his garment 
about him." It would have l3een needless for the angel 
to have required Peter to open the gate, and to knock 
off his chains, for he had not power to do so : and it 
would have been needless for the angel to buckle his 
girdle, or to bind on his sandals, because he had power 
to dress himself. Thus we affirm concerning the Gos- 
pel. If any parts of it be beyond our capacities; it is 



I 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 171 

needless to require us to believe them, for we can nev- 
er believe what we cannot understand. If other parts 
of the Gospel be within our reach, it is needless to re- 
quire others to do that for us, which we are able to do 
for ourselves. The Gospel of some Christians is very- 
hard ; it is not fair to require us to believe it ; they say 
the}^ do not understand it themselves ; bat the C-rospcl, 
according to the four evangelists is not of this kinrl. 
Christian, know the Gospel of your master, and the dig- 
nity of yourself, and say to every pretender to dominion 
over you, '^ No doubt but ye are the people, and Vvis- 
dom shall die with you. But I have understanding as well 
as you ; I am not inferior to you : yea, who knoweth 
not such things as tliese ? And bo it indeed that 1 have 
erred, mine error remaineth with myself." 

Consider in the next place, that the exercise of this 
Christian libert;/ cannot possibly be an injury to other 
Christians. Which of the ten commandments does a man 
break, by following his own convictions in religion? 
Suppose the worst, that he is in an error ; yet '• his er- 
ror remaineth with himself." Is any one of us less 
wise, less just, or less safe, because another does that 
for himself, which we every day do for ourselves ? Our 
safety is not endangered by his taking the liberty to 
think for himself: it is we who endanger his safety by 
taking the liberty to think for liim. In such a case we 
should be less wise and less just than we ought to be ; as 
he would be, if he allowed us to run our liberty into such 
licentiousness. How is it that men, Christian men too, 
can see one another's sicknesses, and hear of one anoth- 
er's misfortunes, without any emotions of anger, and 
with all the feelings of humanity and pity that Christians 
ought to have for one another ; and that they cannot 
hear to hear a conscientious man avow sentiments differ- 
ent from their own, without a red resentment, that like 
a hot thunderbolt hisses, and wounds, and kills where it 
falls ? No, it is not justice, it is not prudence, it is not 
humanity, it is not benevolence, it is not zeal for these 
dispositions : it seems as if it were the explosion of an 
infected heart, where the milk of human kinduess never 
flowed. If such emotions can proceed from Christians, 



172 JESUS CHRIST 

we must suppose, what we are loath to think, that is, 
that some Christians are in some unhappy moments di- 
vested of all the principles of their holy religion, and 
actuated by the dispositions of the most ignorant and 
cruel of mankind. But, say they, though we receive 
no injury, yet God is dishonoured. Ah ! is God dishon- 
oured? imitate his conduct then. Does he thunder, 
does he lighten, does he afflict this poor man? Behold 
his sun enlightens his habitation, his rain refreshes his 
lields, his gentle breeze fans and animates him every 
day ; his revelation lies always open before him ; his 
throne of mercy is ever accessible to him ; and will 
you, rash Christian, will you mark him out for ven- 
geance ? I repeat it again, imitate your heavenly Fa- 
ther, and at least suspend your anger till that day, when 
" the Lord will make manifest the counsels of men's 
hearts ; and then shall every man have praise of God." 
Then will you perfectly understand the justice, as well 
as the kindness of these interrogations. " Who maketh 
thee to differ from another? and what hast thou that 
thou didst not receive ? Now if thou didst receive it, 
why dost thou glory as if thou hadst not received it ?" 
As therefore dominion over conscience is needless, so 
the utmost exercise of Christian liberty is innocent, and 
there is no restraining it without incurring guilt. 

Remark, further, that free inquiry in religion is e^- 
seniial to the virtue of a character. The virtue of man 
consists in his making use of all his own faculties ;' not 
in believing that other men have made a virtuous use 
of theirs. Now it is possible, a man may make u-^e 
of all his faculties, and yet not be able to perceive the 
evidence of some opinions, which are called articles of 
faith ; and consequently he may doubt the truth of those 
articles, yea, it is necessary to the virtue of his charac- 
ter that he should doubt them ; for it is not in his pow- 
er to believe without proof, and it would be unjust to pro- 
fess to believe what he does not believe. Let us not be 
so weak as to imagine, that a man cannot think justly 
unless he thinks as we do. Let us allow that his justice 
consists in thinking, and reasoning, and acting as well 
as he can; and that he is accountable for all this, only 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 173 

to " one master, even Christ." As freedom of thought 
is the parent and guardian of all virtue, so the want of 
it is the nurse of vice, and particularly of that general 
disposition to all sin ; I mean servility. A low, servile 
soul, habituated not to think for itself, but to be led by 
a guide, is prepared for the commission of any crime, 
or the belief of any absurdity, that a mercenary guide 
may find convenient to enjoin. No men teach the de- 
pravity, the extreme and excessive depravity of human 
nature, with a better grace than these men. Were I 
disposed to sink a soul into the lowest degree of wretch- 
edness, either as a citizen of the world, or as a member 
of a church, I would inculcate, with all my might, a 
spirit of servility, and that would answer my end better 
than any other method in the world. I would not shock a 
man with the sounds of perjury and blasphemy, impiety to 
God and injustice to men ; but I would gently inform 
him, that he was a poor, depraved, foolish creature, not 
able to judge between good and evil, truth and error, 
and that he would discover great arrogance if he thought 
otherwise : but that I was a wise and sacred man, wish- 
ing well to his soul, and that by believing what I said 
to be true, and by doing what I directed to be done, he 
would be pious, and safe, and happy. There is there- 
fore no virtue, but a great fund of iniquity in implicit 
faith. 

Observe further, that a Christian, who takes Christ 
for his only and sufficient governor in religion, is sup- 
ported by the examples of all genuine Christians, from 
the days of Christ to this moment. The apostles had 
no master but Jesus Christ. The primitive Christians 
had no other master than he; for the apostles exercised 
no " dominion over their faith," though they were '' help- 
ers of their joy." The church of Rome, when they 
shook oflf the imperial yoke, acted under the same au- 
thority. All other churches, when they cast off the do 
minion of the Bishop of Rome, went on the same prin- 
ciples, and were justified in doing so. If you imitate 
these examples, you incorporate into your conduct -what 
was excellent in theirs ; and if you allow others the 
same freedom, which you yourselves enjoy, you excel 
15* 



174 \ JESXJS CHRIST 

latter Christians, and copy the lives of the first and 
purest professors of the Christian religion. 

It would be endless to enumerate reasons in suppwt 
of this doctrine ; and I am happy to observe, that you 
are in full possession of one practical argument, which 
triumphs over all suspicion. You have made an exper- 
iment of this doctrine. You are free yourselves, and 
your brethren are free along with you. Hence that 
freedom of speech in your teachers ; for nobody is so 
weak as to imagine that all our hearers should adopt 
all the principles we lay down. We propose a subject, 
you think of it, you do not see evidence of it. What 
then ? Nothing at all. 

Hence that spirit of free inquiry, which is cherished 
among you. You habituate yourselves to read the 
Scriptures, to make use of your own understandings, to 
inquire of one another how it is written, and of whom 
speaketh the prophet. Hence that investigation of a 
subject, which you pursue, and those interesting, eager, 
and friendly debates, which you conduct with so much 
edification to one another, and with so much honour to 
the soundness of your understandings, and to the sweet- 
ness of your tempers. You have learned the happy art 
of hearing without any unkind emotions your own senti- 
ments contradicted, sifted, and tried ; and it never en- 
ters into your minds to injure, to grieve, or even to sus- 
pect the good and honest soul, who thinks for himself, 
but who does not think with you. 

Hence comes that mild and gentle discipline, which 
sets open the Lord's table to all who profess faith in 
Christ and repentance towards God. I have spoken im- 
properly. You have not set the Lord's table abroad j 
it was he himself who did so : but you have avoided the 
folly of inclosing it, of obliging all to approach it by a 
strait, dark passage, kept by a surly animal, in shape a 
man, in temper a mastiff. Hence that honest proposal 
of believers' baptism as a primitive institute of Jesus 
Christ, and that just liberty given to every brother to 
judge of the nature and necessity of what you propose. 
If he believes, he is baptized ; if he thinks infant bap- 
tism a divine institute, exemplified by Christ, and en- 



THE GOVERNOR OF HIS DISCIPLES. 175 

joined on the children of his disciples, he procures a 
neighbouring teacher to baptize them ; and though this 
hath been the practice of this society for more than a 
hundred and fiity years, yet there is no instance in your 
recollection or in your records, of the least degree of 
bitterness or incivility on that account. 

Hence that generous regard, which you manifest to 
all good men of every denomination. You hear their 
instructions with mildness ; you examine them with in- 
tegrity, you adopt them with gratitude, or you refuse 
them with civility, accompanying your unbelief with a 
thousand kind offices, far better to the good men than 
your orthodoxy. Hence that just distinction, which you 
make in regard to all the duties you owe your fellow- 
creatures. You observe that you are bound by the law 
of nature, and by the express revelation of Scripture, to 
love your neighbour as yourself; yonr neighbour in gen- 
eral, not your sound neighbour in particular. 

Hence comes the inexpressible joy of your hopes. 
You see at no great distance, death. You consider 
dying as a passage to immortal life. You consider im- 
mortal life as the inheritance of all good men; and 
there you hope benevolence, which, in its utmost exer- 
cise here, is only in the bud, will ripen into fruits of in- 
conceivable extent, duration, and beauty. Much of the 
jo}'^ of such prospects arises from the exercise of benev- 
olence. What interest have we in the destruction of 
our fellow-creatures ? Is it impossible for us to be hap- 
py unless some of our fellow-creatures be miserable ? 
How can a bigot be happy by believing, that the infin- 
itely wise and good God will contract himself into the 
size, the narrow size of a school-boy's soul, will make 
his childish distinctions, enter into his silly schemes, 
and rule and judge a world of" ten thousand times ten 
thousand, and thousands of thousands," not by the per- 
fections of his own nature, and the well known laws of 
his government, but will make all move to the drowsy 
musick of the tinkling bells of a pedant. A happiness 
founded on benevolence, rests on the pillars that sup- 
port the universe : it may be shaken, it never can be 
subverted. On this subject we have no reproofs, and but 



176 JESUS CHRIST, &C. 

one exhortation to give you, and that is contained in 
one word, persevere. " As many as walk according- to 
this rule, peace be on them, and mercy !" They are 
" the Israel of God." ''' Grace be with all them that 
love our Lord Jesus Christ in sincerity." Amen. 



DISCOUKSE X. 

THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT BE CONFOUNDED 
WITH HEATHENISM. 

[AT LITTLE SHELFORD.} 



coLossiANs ii. 8, 9. 

Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and 
vain deceit^ after the tradition of men ^ after the rudi- 
ments of the -worlds and not after Christ : for in him 
dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. 

'' Beware lest any man spoil you" . . . What ! is it 
possible to spoil a Christian? Indeed it is. A Chris- 
tian may spoil himself as a beautiful complexion or a 
proper shape may be rendered disagreeable by circum- 
stances of dress or uncleanliness ; he may be spoiled by 
other people, just as a straight child may be made 
crooked by the negligence of his nurse ; or exactly as a 
sweet-tempered youth may be made surly or insolent 
h}'^ a cruel master. " Beware lest any man spoil you." 
Is it possible for whole societies of Christians to be 
spoiled ? Certainly it is. Nothing is easier. They 
may spoil one another, as in a family, the temper of 
one single person may spoil the peace of the whole ; or 
as in a school, one trifling or turbulent master may spoil 
the education, and so the usefulness, through life, of two 
or three hundred pupils, successively committed to hjs 



178 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

injudicious treatment. All human constitutions, even 
the most excellent, have seeds of imperfections in them, 
some mixtures of folly, which naturally tend to weaken 
and destroy ; and though this is not the case with the 
Christian religion itself, which is the wisdom of God 
without any mixture of human folly ; yet even this pure 
religion, like the pure juice of the grape, falling into 
the hands of depraved men, may be perverted, and 
whole societies may embrace Christianity thus per- 
verted. 

Beware lest any man spoil you through . . . what? 
Idolatry, blasphemy, profligacy? No. Christians are 
in very little danger from great crimes ; but beware 
lest any man spoil you through philosophy. What hath 
philosophy done, that the apostle should thus guard 
Cliristiars against it 1 Did not he know that before his 
time, while mimics were idly amusing one part of the 
world, and heroes depopulating another, the peaceable 
sons of philosophy disturbed nobody, but either improv- 
ed mankind in their schools, or sat all calm and content 
in their cells ? Did he not observe that in his time 
Christianity was reputed folly, because it was taught 
and believed by unlettered people ; and that if philoso- 
phers could be prevailed on to teach it, it would have in- 
stantly acquired a character of wisdom ? Whether the 
common people had understood it or not, they would 
have reckoned it wise if philosophers had taught it. 
The apostle knew all this, and, far from courting the 
aid of learned men to secure credit to the Gospel, he 
guards Christians in the ieiLi against the future tempta- 
tion of doing so. Had this caution been given us by 
any of the other apostles, who had not had the advan- 
tage of a learned education, we might have supposed, 
they censured what they did not understand ; but this 
comes from the disciple of Gamaliel. 

The wise apostle assigns two reasons for the caution. 
" Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy." 
Why? Because philosophy doth not go on the same 
ground as Christizmity. Philosophy is a body of Avis- 
dom made up of the speculations, and conjectures, and 
inferences of studious, learned men j but Christianity is 



BE CONFOUNDED With HEATHENISM. 179 

a body of information reported to us by the express com- 
mand of Almighty God. This is the meaning of the ex- 
pression, " After the tradition of men, after the rudi- 
ments of the world, and not after Christ," that is Chris- 
tianity. The apostle observes, that there is a perfec- 
tion in the information given us by Jesus Christ, for he 
taught us only facts : but philosophy, which is the sci- 
ence of investigating the nature of facts, is on this very 
account uncertain, vain, and deceitful, when applied to 
the Christian religion. Reduce the subject to two parts, 
and they amount to this ; the wisdom of the heathen 
schools was vain and deceitful, because it was not true ; 
and the wisdom of modern schools, though true in itself, 
is deceitful when applied to Christianity. It is this 
last view of the subject, on which we mean to fix your 
attention ; and we shall only aim to explain and im- 
prove it. God Grant we may be edified ! 

I am sure it is not necessary in this assembly, to 
prove, that there is nothing in this text, or in any other 
text in the Bible meant to injure human learning. Je- 
sus Christ did not honour the schools with his presence ; 
but Jesus Christ had the spirit of God without measure. 
The first apostles were illiterate men ; but Jesus took 
them under his tuition before he sent them to teach. 
There are thousands of good Christians now, who have 
no learning; as there are thousands of generous hearts, 
who have no money. There are many edifying teach- 
ers, who can only just read their Bibles, and expound it 
by their own feelings ; and w^hen they prudently teach 
such parts of religion as belong to experiment, who is 
not animated by their instructions ? There are many 
who aifect to have learning, which they have not ; and 
there are some who have it and abuse it ; but none 
of these is sufficient to induce us to condemn the wis- 
dom of the schools. The design of the apostle is not to 
destroy, but to direct philosophy. He knew, a learned 
man could no more teach the Gospel, without his liter- 
ature, than other men could hear it without their konwl- 
edge of husbandry, gardening, building, and so on ; but 
as each of these branches of knowledge ought to be re- 
strained to its own subjects, so ought philosophy. Ify at 



180 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

any time, a young gentleman should, under pretence of 
teaching us the Gospel, set forth all his fine things, and 
waste the hour devoted to religion, in jingling his silver 
bells, let us consider him as we consider our sons, when 
they come from school, and talk Latin, or propose hard 
questions in arithmetic to their mothers. Both classes 
are good at heart, for they intend to give us pleasure. 
Both err from the same cause, the infancy of their un- 
derstandings ; and age and experience will complete 
their education. 

To come to the point. Let us distinguish Christian- 
ity from the philosophy of it. By Christianity I mean 
the Christian religion. By the Christian religion I 
mean that set of facts, which Jesus Christ taught, and 
which are all recorded in the Gospel. Our notion is, 
that these facts are reported to us for the sake of the 
use to which we are able to apply them, and not laid 
down as philosophers lay down their speculations in the 
schools, for the sake of exercising the geniuses of young 
gentlemen to make improvements. This distinction 
between facts and their uses apart from the philosophy 
of them, is founded in nature : and it is the more credi- 
ble, because it makes Christianity exactly like the world 
in which we live, and so gives it a character of divini- 
ty, showing that the maker of the world is the author 
of our holy religion. 

I must not go down this evening from this frame, till 
I have some way or other conveyed this subject into the 
minds of all my hearers. The day's work is done, the 
cattle are all at rest, the evening is pleasant, the fra- 
grance of the trees in blossom all around us, is highly 
refreshing ; the grass on which many of you sit is an ele- 
gant carpet, and you seem all to be very attentive ; can 
I ever choose a time more proper to treat a subject, 
which, though not hard when the apostle wrote, is be- 
come so now by what philosophers have done to i£? 

Consider me this evening as doing nothing with this 
subject except what you all do in saifron time. You 
gather the flowers early, with great care ; and after 
you get home, you leisurely pick oif the beautiful blue 
bell and throw it away, for the sake of the more valu- 



•BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. 1 81 

able chive in the middle, which j^ou save, and by the 
help of a kiln bring to the consistence of a dry, fibrous 
cake, which you call saffron, and sell to pay your rents, 
and to maintain your families. Now, who is there in 
this assembly that cannot distinguish between the fact, 
the use, and the philosophy of saffron ? 

Observe first the fact, and the use of knowing the 
fact. Every man in this parish knows the bulbs, which 
you call heads. Every child knows how to drop them, 
one by one, at equal distances, into the trenches after the 
spadesman. Every body knows that cattle must be kept 
off by fences, and that the ground must be clean hoed 
just before the saffron is expected to spring up. All the 
month before saffron-time the parish become prophets, 
and half the poor men spring up in the morning, before 
it is well day, and run without their clothes out of doors 
to look after their old benefactors, the clouds. No 
rain, no saffron. Thus a fine shower makes all the 
children smile in hopes of a plentiful saffron-time, and 
consequently new clothes against winter. When the 
time comes, how cheerfully you rise by the moon or the 
stars, flock into the field, and pick the flowers before 
the sun is up ! Presently the streets are all flowers, 
the tables and the kilns are covered with chives, and 
the end of all is, the whole is exchanged for money^ 
money for clothes, a Bible and a hymn book, and these 
convey instruction to you and your families, to fear God 
and keep his commandments, which make you live so- 
berly, and die peaceably, in hopes of a joyful resurrec- 
tion. 

Now here is a set of facts and uses, all wliich you 
perfectly understand, and 3^our knowledge in this view 
is complete ; but the philosophy of all these facts is a 
very different thing. Some have no knowledge at all 
of it, and they that know most of it are only as far above- 
others as a man upon a mole-hill is above one, of his 
own size, on the level ground. Were a man inclined 
to spoil your saffron trade, he could not take a more 
proper method than to require you to account for the 
size, and shape, and colour, and scent of saffron ; and 
could you be prevailed on to waste the whole saffron- 
16 



182 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

lime in disputing on questions of this kind, instead of 
practising what knowledge you have about facts and 
uses, you would be spoiled to all intents and purposes. 
This is not only the case with the knowledge of flow- 
ers; it is the same with all other things in the world. 
We know the uses of things, but we do not know the na- 
ture of them. As it is with the saffron-grower in his 
rood of land, so it is with the mariner, who sails all 
round the globe ; and as it is with common observation, 
so it is almost with the deepest speculation ; a glass can 
carry the eye a little way ; and intense thought can car- 
ry reason a little way further ; but the discovery of 
vast and boundless tracks beyond, will always leave a 
studious man very modest, because it will always leave 
him very near his plain neighbours. 

What we contend for is this ; that our holy religion 
exactly resembles the world in which we live ; and to 
make my meaning as clear as I can ; I will lay a few 
truths before the two sorts of men in question ; the plain 
Christian who confines himself to facts and their uses, 
and the Christian full of philosophy. By the way, there 
are many Christians extremely ignorant of the wisdom 
of the schools, who yet will be always applying the sci- 
ence of other men to their own ideas of religion ; and 
what with learned words and vulgar ideas, polished 
phrases and gross notions, great sounds and little or no 
meaning ; they make the Christian religion the most 
abstruse of all hard things in the world. Do you won- 
der you do not understand them ? They do not under- 
stand themselves. 

One fact reported in Scripture is, that " all have^sinned 
and come short of the glory of God." The proof of this 
fact is made, by bringing out Divine law, and compar- 
ing it with our conduct. The plain Christian attends 
to this fact; he examines his life, traces his actions, 
and finds they take their rise in disordered passions in 
his owil bosom. This was an action of pride, that was 
an exercise of revenge ; a third proceeded from anger, 
and a fourth from an immoderate love of the world. 
He carries back his reflection, and finds that his pas- 
sions have been in disorder ever since he could remem- 



BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. 183 

ber. He soon finds out the use of the knowledg-e of 
this fact ; for if it would give him pain to discover that he 
had lost his children, or his property, or his health, it 
must needs till him with sorrow, to fmd that he has lost 
his innocence, and with that all right to he happy. Full 
of this just griei", he checks sin, and avoids temptations 
to commit it. Give this sad truth to a philosopher, and 
he will perplex it with hard questions, and answers yet 
more hard than the questions themselves, and will go 
into abundance of labyrinths, some before the creation 
of the world, and others after the consummation of it. 
There will come up in this man's religion, a great ar- 
my of infants and angels ; there will be Adani and Eve, 
and our immediate parents, and a world of people from 
all corners of the globe, and every one will bring a new 
question, and all together will lead us oil from the great 
use of the knowledge of the fact, which is sorrow for 
our own sin, and not that of Adam and infants, and an- 
gels and heathens. When the good man of the house 
hath caught cold, and the good dame puts a little saf- 
fron into his drink, does she, doth he, doth any one in 
the family attend to any thing more than the effects 
which they know by experience will be produced ? 

It is reported in the Holy Scriptures, that there is a 
God, the first cause of all things, the Creator, the Pre- 
server, the Benefactor, and Friend of mankind ; that 
he sent word to us by prophets and apostles ; and above 
all by his Son Jesus Christ, our Lord : that though he 
blamed our conduct, yet he pitied our condition, and 
would freely forgive all our offences, of every kind, 
through the mediation of Jesus Christ. The plain 
Christian hears this information, and examines it. He 
is not surprised that God should esteem man his crea- 
ture, for he knows love is natural to him. He is not 
shocked that God should blame sin, for he himself \s 
obliged to condemn it, though by so doing he passes 
sentence on himself. He knows it must be in the pow- 
er of God to make the wretched happy; and ho at once 
perceives it will be highly to the honour of his wisdom 
and goodness to do so. He observes, that if any despise 
what it is so much to the honour of God to propose, he 



184- THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

is exceedingly to blame, and ought to siifier the con- 
sequences. He is not offended that God shouM choose 
to dispense all this goodness bj the hands of Jesus 
Christ ; for he sees that there is but one iirst cau'-e, -vad 
that God communicates his goodness to us by meau^~, in 
e^ery case. He soon finds the use of this iiiformatiou ; 
it resembles the fragrance of a f'lower, or the warmth of 
the sun ; it draws, and we walk after it, admiring, ador- 
ing, enjoying, and imitating God. Give a philosopher 
this truth, and he will perplex every part of it, by in- 
quiring how this God subsists, what is the precise nature 
of Jesus Christ, and so on, till, having dissected the sub- 
ject into a thousand parts, given each an Egyptian, or 
a Hebrew, or a Greek name, and garnished the whole 
with scholastical ghosts, summoned by a kind of magic 
from all schools, ancient and modern, he will render 
this glorious truth hardly credible, or glaringly false. 
Allow me to make one reflection, while I think of it. 
You have heard some of your ministers speak of a dan- 
gerous set of men, whom they call, if I recollect the 
word rightly, deists^ or some such name. I humbly be- 
seech you not to be rash in censuring people for being 
enemies to the Gospel. There may be, for any thing I 
know, such men in the world ; but I shall never believe 
that sincere men are such, till they are distinguished as 
the Jews are in Rome, by wearing a red hat. I do de- 
clare, and I am acquainted with several, and so are you, 
that some are reputed enemies to the Gospel, only be- 
cause they are enemies to that abuse of the Gospel, of 
which we are speaking. It is not the Gospel according 
to the Evangelists that they find fault with, it is the 
Gospel according to Wittemberg, where Luther taught ; 
or to Geneva, where Dr. John Calvin lived : great men, 
but they would have been much greater if they hud not 
applied their philosophy to religion. 

The Scripture requires us, if we believe Christianity, 
to profess it by being baptized, and to keep the death 
of the author of it always in memory, by eating bread 
and drinking wine in our religious assemblies. Nothing 
can be plainer in the world than these two ordinances j 
nothing was better understood, before learned men per- 



BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. 185 

plexed them ; and, what is very wonderful, though the 
schools have rejected the old philosophy, on finding it 
false, yet they have retained it in these two ordinances. 
There were formerly in the schools, what they called 
occult qualities. Do not set your eyes on me as if I 
could explain them ; nobody ever understood them, and 
the words were only used for a cloak to conceal the ig- 
norance of learned men. By supposing two such quali- 
ties in these two ordinances ; they have both been ren- 
dered ridiculous in the eyes of sensible men. In re- 
gard to baptism, you must not object that an infant can- 
not answer, and therefore ought not to be questioned ; 
or cannot believe, and therefore ought not to be bap- 
tized into a profession, which he doth not understand 
and approve. A Catholic philosopher will tell you, that 
he believes with the faith of the church, and that the 
godfather represents the church on this occasion. One 
reformed philosopher will tell you, that the child was 
born in sin, and that the water washes it away ; and 
another will inform you that the water conveys grace, 
and that the child receives faith, and hope, and so on. 
You do not see the child commit any sin ; you cannot name 
the sin that he is capable of committing ; you do not see 
him practise any virtue ; you cannot conceive a virtue 
that he is capable of practising ; and you cannot think 
it just either to burn him for his vice, or to reward him 
for his virtue ; no matter for all your objections, there 
are occult^ or hidden qualities. The same in regard to 
the Lord's supper. We see nothing but bread in the 
Catholic church in the administration ; we smell no- 
thing, we taste nothing but bread : no matter, it is the 
flesh, and blood, and bones of a man, and there is no 
bread there. We see nothing but bread and wine in 
the Lutheran church, yet they say, the flesh and blood 
of Christ are there, just as fire is in a red hot iron. It 
is very likely that Jesus Christ should order his disci- 
ples to practise baptism and the Lord's supper in the 
manner mentioned in Scripture ; but it is not at all like- 
ly that he should propose them to us in the manner last 
mentioned. They talk a deal of the danger of the Gos- 
pel in the hands of the poor and illiterate ; but have 
16* 



1-86 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

the unlearned ever done any thing like this ? " Be- ' 
ware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and 
vain deceit." 

Our religion teaches us some great motives to engage 
us to be good ; such as the immortality of the soul, the 
resurrection of the dead, the eternal happiness of hea- 
ven, and the endless misery of hell. These plain truths 
are facts of prophecy, which we are taught to believe 
will come to pass. The proof that they will be accom- 
plished lies in the person of the prophet, who foretold 
them. All animals die, and man as well as the rest. 
There is no instance of any animal coming to life after its 
death, except man. The man Jesus, who taught us that 
we should live in a future state, condescended, in his 
own person, to die in the open road, in the presence of 
a multitude of beholders, pierced to the heart with a 
spear, so that his death could not be doubted. Three 
days after, he came to life again, and showed himself 
to his family, and afterwards to great numbers, to five 
hundred at one time. As to the fact, that it was the 
same person with whom they had been acquainted be- 
fore, they were fully assured of it by conversing with 
him, and handling him. As to the use of the fact, that 
they ought to infer that the doctrine of such a person 
was true, they perfectly understood that too : and bothi 
these are as easy to us, if not easier than they were to 
them. They did not know, nor was it necessary to the 
truth of the fact, that they should know, how all this 
was eflfected. A plain Christian imitates the apostles, 
obtains proof of the fact, that Christ rose from the 
dead, and then applies his knowledge to the use of hop- 
ing that he shall live in a future state, as Jesus hath 
foretold. When a philosopher go^s to work upon thisr 
doctrine of immortality, he takes man all to pieces, and 
divides him into many parts, and says. This is earth, earth 
is not immortal ; this is fire, fire is not immortal ; this 
is thought, thoughts are successional ; which of them is 
immortal? My brethren, leave the worthy man to his 
learned meditations ; by and by they will hang round 
him like icicles, and, when he begins to freeze, his own 
paiti wjU make him cry, " Where is God, my Maker V^ 



BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. 1 87 

Should he come up against you, and attack your faith in 
a blessed immortality ; do not be afraid of his points, 
but take up this weapon and defend yourselves. Say, t 
do not trouble myself to study whether I be naturally 
mortal or immortal ; but, be that as it may, if God de- 
clares man shall live in a future state, undoubtedly 
he who keeps him alive forty years, can make him live 
forty millions, if he pleases. He hath not required me 
to determine which atom is perishable, and which is 
not ; but he hath taught me that man shall live in a fu- 
ture state, and he hath shown me in the resurrection of 
Jesus Christ from the dead, the rising again of all man- 
kind. 

It is not only the doctrine of Christianity that is hurt 
by philosophy ; the spirit of it is exceedingly injured. 
The temper and spirit of Jesus was modest, mild, peace- 
able, full of mercy and good fruits. The Gospel is of 
the same disposition, and where it is considered as a train 
of events to be applied to use, it never fails to produce 
the same just and gentle dispositions. When it becomes 
a science, it becomes disputatious, haughty, sour, and 
full of mischief. Whence came persecution, with ail 
its infernal train ? It was from this spirit. The dis- 
putes, which have affected the peace of the whole 
Christian world, have not been about the Lord's prayer, 
the Ten commandments, and the Sermon upon the mount ; 
but about curious and knotty questions, which have 
something plausible on both sides, and are therefore 
like to make work for contentious men to the end of the 
world. Whence is it, that we do not know whether we 
ought to love a fellow-creature, much less whether we 
are bound to respect him as a Christian, till we know 
how he understands some old stale questions of the 
schools, which ought to have been buried with the first 
inventors of them ? The questions are harmless enough 
in themselves ; for in general it does not signify much 
to practice, which side we take. They are harmless 
enough in some people, whose good sense, and sweet 
temper, and great piety, correct all their actions, and 
make every thing they say, and do, agreeable and edi- 
fying ; but they play the mischief in unskilful or design- 
ipg hands. 



188 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

We have run through a brief explication, and now wc 
will subjoin two cautions, and so conclude with the use 
of the doctrine. Let no one imagine, in the first place, 
that there is any thing in Christianity, Avhich will not 
bear the strictest scrutiny. We say that of every part 
of the Christian religion, which we affirm of every flow- 
er in the universe. There is not one, that doth not 
contain a whole volume of information : but we contend, 
that in regard to you, in this parish, neither the rose, 
nor the water lil}'^, nor any other flower in the world, 
is the subject of your chief attention ; it is saffron, and 
saff'ron alone, that you are called by Providence to study. 
Thus we say, The business of your poor people in this 
parish is with the Bible, and as your time and circum- 
stances will allow you to read but one book, the Bible 
is the book in the world the best fitted for you. As we 
said concerning the one flower, which makes the busi- 
ness and the wealth of some of you ; so we say of the 
Bible : You should attend to the facts, and know the 
uses, and let questions about natures alone. I call this a 
perfect religion for you ; and I verily believe you can- 
not mistake the uses of the various parts of the Bible. 
What is the use of a book ? I ask the little girls. Were 
I to put one into your hands, you would directly open 
and read it ; that is, you would apply it to the use for 
which I gave it you. Should you find a prayer in it, 
composed by Jesus Christ, beginning '' Our Father, who 
art in heaven," you would know that this was intended 
to be spoken upon the knees to Almighty God. Should 
you find a passage where God calls himself a " shepherd," 
and men " the sheep of his pasture," you would directly 
know the use of this, that it was intended to engage 
you cheerfully to trust yourself, and your children, the 
lambs of the flock, to the conduct of his wise Provi- 
dence : and so of the rest. In the next life, where we 
shall not be interrupted by wants, or bounded by time, or 
blinded by sin, we shall see to the bottom of every thing, 
and feast our souls with the sight : there you will be- 
come philosophers without any danger of error: but 
here, where time is short, " beware lest any man spoil 
you through philosophy and vain deceit." 



iaE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. , 1 89 

Let us use another precaution to guard the practice 
of religion, as we have endeavoured to guard the doc- 
trine of it. " Let us beware lest any man spoil us." 
There are two ways of spoiling Christians, the one is 
very long and expensive, the other short and cheap. 
The long way is by taking a little hoy before he be able 
to reason and judge for himself, by prejudicing him 
against the Gospel, by learning him to shake his head 
over it as a deep, dark, diificult book, which cannot be 
understood, without a vast stock of human learning : by 
expending all you are worth in the world, or by bur- 
dening some public charity with a boy, neither lame 
nor blind, to be brought up to understand the Gospel : 
by getting him taught the follies and the trifles of old 
heathen writers ; by giving him to understand as he 
grows up, that he is a youth of extraordinary wisdom, 
and of a higher order than the rest of mankind ; by 
learning him to dress fine, to become expensive, and to 
find a thousand things necessary to his rank, of which 
none of his family ever heard the names before ; by 
teaching him to take learning in lieu of piety ; and the 
dignity of a priest to give force to religion, instead of 
reason, modesty, and a holy example ; by habituating 
him to consider Christianity as under a sentence of death, 
unless such as he condescended to maintain its reputa- 
tion in the world. Do not say, " He speaks parables.'^ 
Indeed I do not. I. tell you a true history. Did you 
never see a farmer's son made a minister of the Gospel 
vi^ithout any religion ? 

There is a short way of spoiling men : perhaps you 
may think I could not prevail with you to believe or to 
say, that when you are so kind as to pay me a friendly 
visit, you were at London at the same time. This, how- 
ever, I affirm, is nothing to what I could do without any 
expense or trouble, provided you would agree to one 
thing. Only lay it down for a rule, that, though you 
are to make use of your senses and reason, your eyes 
and your judgment, in all other cases, j^et when I speak 
to you, you are to make, use of none of them ; but to 
believe what I say without examining ; or, which wili 
answer the same end, to say you do. Grant this, and I 



190 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

will bring 3''ou, if not to believe, yet to affirm, and kill 
and slay in proof of it, that you drink me in a tea-spoon 
full of wine ; that a hundred people beside, do the same, 
and that ten thousand people in different parts of the 
world do so too, at the same time ; and yet I, the man 
thus distributed shall continue standing and preaching 
in this place all the while. Thus the doctrines, the or- 
dinances, and the disciples of Jesus Christ may be spoil- 
ed of all their tnith and beauty, till they, the glory of 
the world, are thrown aside as the rubbish of it. 

Happy would it be for a teacher of Christianity, if he 
could always close here, well assured that nobody would 
pervert his doctrine. Happy, if all hearers of Chris- 
tian sermons had a habit of dexterously applying each 
part to its proper use. This is, through our inattention, 
sometimes difficult. Lest any such mistake should af- 
fect you, let us, before we part, apply the subject to the 
worst condition that can be supposed among you, the 
condition of a man actually spoiled. I will not irritate 
your grief by asking. Who " gave you for a spoil ?" 
Where were you going when you " fell among thieves," 
who stripped you of your raiment, wounded you, and 
left you half dead ? Let us, for the present, omit such 
mortifying questions, and let us address ourselves to 
your relief. " Peace be to thee, peace be to thine 
house, and peace be unto all that thou hast !'" 

See, the spoilers have not robbed thee of the Scrip- 
tures. Here are all the Prophecies, and all the accom- 
plishments of them in plain, true history. Here are the 
" words of eternal life," spoken to Peter and others, and 
written for your use. Here are all the promises, like 
all the flowers that adorn the earth in spring, fresh and 
fragrant, as if they had never administered pleasure to 
the scent of man. Here is the book of the Acts of the 
Apostles, shewing us how they understood their Divine 
Master. Here are all the Epistles, comments upon the 
Gospel. Here are numbers of such as yourself in both 
Testaments saying, " Come see a man, who told us nil 
things that ever we did ; is not this the Christ ? Be- 
hold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the 
world," " Blind Bartimeus ! Be of good comfort, rise 



BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHEN^ISM. .. 191 

Jesus calleth thee." Here are even " Psalms and 
Hymns, and spiritual Songs," ready composed for you 
to sing the praise of your deliverer. Here are prayers 
fitted to the weakest understandings, and the shortest 
memories, " words to take with you" and «ay, " Take 
away ail iniquity and receive us graciously ; in thee the 
fatherless findeth mercy." Thanks be to God, whoev- 
er ihe spoilers were, the profligate or the formal, the 
learned or the ignorant, they have not been suffered to 
rob you of this inestimable treasure. This was not ow- 
ing to your care, negligent man, but to that watchful 
friend who " loved you with an everlasting love," and 
who, all the while 5^ou lived in sin, said, "^ There shall 
be a day, that the watchman shall cry" to that forlorn 
man, ''Arise, and go up to Zion, unto the Lord your 
God." 

See, again, the spoilers have not robbed you of your 
sense and reason. I am sorry to say they are damage^ j 
but, let us be thankful, they are not irrecoverably lost 
You have eyes to read, and ears to hear ; and the best 
use you can make of them, and the only way to recover 
them to their first strength, is to say, " I will go even 
to the seat of God. I will order my cause before him, 
and fill my mouth with arguments. I will know the 
words which he will answer me, and understand what 
he will say unto me. Will he plead against me with 
his great power ?" Vv^hat a question, what a dangerous 
question is this for you, great sinner, to agitate ? How 
will you procure an answer ? Shall any ascend up into 
heaven to fetch it down ? Open your eyes and read ; 
or your ears and hear : the answer is here in my hand. 
'• Will he plead against you with his great power ? Ko, 
"but he will put strength in you, suffer you to dispute 
with him, and deliver you forever from your judge." 
You have not lost your reason. " Stand still then, that 
I may reason with you before the Lord, of all the right- 
eous acts," the fit and proper acts, " of the Lord, which 
he did" to such as you. AVhen the Jews cried, he " sent 
Moses and Aaron to bring them out of the land of Egypt. 
When they forgot God, he sold them into the hands of 
the Philistines. When they cried and said. We have 



19^ THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

sinned, but now deliver us, and we will serve thee ; 
the Lord sent judges to deliver them." This hath been 
his manner from the beginning, and to you, as well as 
to the Jews, he saith, " Come now, and let us reason 
together ; cease to do evil, learn to do well ; though 
your sins be as scarlet, they shall be white as snow ; 
though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool." 

See, further, the enemy hath not spoiled you of your 
friends. Christians come round a returning prodigal, 
and say, " We have heard a voice of trembling, of fear, 
and not of peace. Alas ! It is the time of Jacob's trou- 
ble, but he shall be saved out of it." He shall not be 
" called an outcast, saying, This is Zion, whom no man 
seeketh after." Penitent, what a multitude of tender 
hearts and generous hands will " pitj^, and bemoan 
thee, and go aside to ask how thou doest !" Teachers 
will instruct thee, elders will pray for thee, and show 
thee, by example, how Christians address God ; the 
courageous will go first and embolden thee, the lively 
will quicken thee, all, like Job's friends, will comfort 
thee; " every man will give thee," if not " a piece of 
money, and an ear-ring of gold," yet, what is beyond 
all riches, wisdom and virtue and friendship. All their 
knowledge will be thine ; for this is a sort of treasure 
which no Christian saith is " his own, but they have all 
things common." " All things are yours, whether Paul, 
or Apollos, or Cephas, or the world, or life, or death, 
or things present, or things to come, all are yours, if 
you are Christ's." 

What ought to give full relief to a man in the condi- 
tion I have supposed, is, that the spoilers have not rob- 
bed him of his Saviour and his God. Jesus Christ hath 
directed his beloved apostle to say, " If any man sin, we 
have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the 
righteous ; and he is the propitiation for our sins, and 
not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole 
world. I write this," said the apostle, " unto you, my 
little children, that ye sin not." You have sinned ; but 
it is possible you may sin more, and add to the list of 
your crimes the sins of obstinacy and despair : it is to 
prevent these that I set before you an advocate with 



BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. 193 

the Father, and " if you know him, you will keep his 
commandments." He that saith, "I know him, and 
keepeth not his commandments, is a liar, and the truth 
is not in him." Jesus Christ is the good shepherd, who 
came into this wilderness in search of his lost sheep; 
and far from grudging relief, when he finds it, he " lay- 
eth it on his shoulders rejoicing, calleth together his 
friends," and saith unto them, " Rejoice with me, for I 
have found my sheep which was lost. There is," saith 
he, " more joy in heaven over one sinner that repent- 
eth, than over ninety and nine just persons, who need 
no repentance." 

God every where expresses his tender love, and cor- 
dial regard to a returning sinner ; hence these just and 
beautiful descriptions : " Behold I will bring the blind 
and the lame, and a great company together. They 
shall come with weeping, and with supplications will I 
lead them ; I will canse them to walk by the rivers of 
waters, in a straight way wherein they shall not stum- 
ble : for I am a father to Israel, and Ephraim is my first- 
born. Hear ye the word of the Lord, O ye nations, and 
declare it in the isles afar oft*, and say. He that scattered 
Israel will gather him, and keep him as a shepherd doth 
his flock." 

I lay aside a multitude of rich and delightful passa- 
ges of Scripture, full of instruction on this subject, the 
mercy of God to a sinner, Jew or Gentile, returning 
from the error of his way ; but allow me to mention 
one, which always strikes me as full of beauty. You 
know the Jews. They were, like you, '' planted a noble 
vine, wholly a right seed :" and their misconduct occa- 
sioned the planter to say, " How then art thou turned 
into the degenerate plant of a strange vine unto me." 
Their crimes were so provoking that the Lord said, 
none of their future services could ever efface their 
guilt. " Though thou wash thee with nitre, and take 
thee much soap, yet thine iniquity is marked before me, 
saith the Lord God." 

The sin of this people lay in what we have been 
complaining of among ourselves, the incorporating of 
heathen principles and heathen tempers into a religion 
17 



1 94 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

revealed from heaven. Nothing- could stop their ca- 
reer. The prophets said, '^ Withhold thy throat from 
thirst ;" and they replied, No, we '^ have loved stran- 
gers, and after them we will go." For a long season 
the Lord had patience with them, and loaded them with 
benefits ; to all which they were insensible : " but he 
being full of compassion, forgave their iniquity ; yea, 
many a time turned he his anger away, for he remem- 
bered that they were but flesh." At length, it became 
necessary to bring them to their senses by afflictions ; 
and the heathens, who had been their betrayers, be- 
came their t3Tants and scourges. It was not enough for 
the compassion of a God to forgive the wretched Jews : 
he did more, he declared by the prophets he would for- 
give the tyrants and spoilers of his people, the Egyp- 
tians, the Assyrians, the Ethiopians, and number them 
with the people of God, sajdng, " Blessed be Egypt my 
people, and Assyria, the work of my hands, and Israel, 
mine inheritance." The description of this is the beau- 
tiful expression I mean ; " In that time shall the present 
be brought unto the Lord of Hosts of a people scattered 
and peeled, a people terrible from their beginning hith- 
erto, a nation meted out and trodden under foot, v/hose 
land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name 
of the Lord of Hosts." It was a law with the Jews, 
given by Moses, to divide the prey taken in war into 
two parts, one half to the soldiers and the other half to 
the people. Out of the half belonging to the soldiers, 
" one soul of five hundred," and out of the people's half,. 
" one of fifty," both of men and beasts were dedicated 
to the Lord, and this was called " the Lord's tribute." 
In allusion to this the prophet saith, " A present of a 
people scattered and peeled, a present of a terrible peo- 
ple shall be brought unto the Lord of Hosts." Methinks 
I see the inhabitants of Jerusalem assembled, the solemn 
procession of the army through the city, the spoils ta- 
ken in war carried in triumph, the numbers of the slain 
published by the heralds, the trembling captives in chains 
going with aching hearts, full of remorse, contrition, 
and repentance, up towards the temple, dreading and 
adoring the God, whom, till now, they had never 



BE CONFOUNDED WITH HEATHENISM. 195 

known, and who, by this terrible calapiity, brought 
them to the knowledge and fear of himself. Go for- 
ward, ye once terrible people ! You are the Lord's trib- 
ute, a present to the Lord of Hosts ; ascend the moun- 
tain, enter the palace of the King of kings, his incense 
is smoking, his sacrifices are bleeding, his priests are 
in waiting, his Levites singing his praises, and his high 
priest, the chief officer in his service, hath an express 
order to disappoint your fears, to exceed your hopes, 
and say to you, " Blessed be Egypt, my people. Be- 
hold, Philistia, and Tyre, with Ethiopia ; Ethiopia 
shall stretch out her hands unto God." All these fig- 
ures will be realized at the last day, when " ten thou- 
sand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands out 
of every tongue, and people, and kindred, and nation, 
the ransomed of the Lord, shall return and come to Zi- 
on with songs, and everlasting joy upon their heads, and 
sorrow and sighing shall flee away." Among that hap- 
py company may you all be ; and in order to that, '' be- 
ware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and 
vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudi- 
ments of the world, and not after Christ." God grant 
you this grace. To him be honour and glory forever. 
Amen. 



DISCOURSE XL 

THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT BE MIXED WITH 
THAT OF THE JEWS. 

[^T FEJVST^JVTOJV.] 



I TIMOTHY Vi. 20, 21. 

Timothy^ keep that which is committed to thy trust, 
aiididing profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of 
science, falsely so called : which some professing have 
erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. 

Brethren, 

You have heard of a court of priests in some fo- 
reign countries, called the Inquisition, a cruel court in 
which men are tried (not by the laws of Christ, you may 
be sure), cast, and condemned to die for not believing 
as they are ordered. I have heard of a blunt prisoner, 
who, after the judge had passed a terrible sentence of 
being burnt to death on him, which he finished with 
praying the Lord to have mercy on his soul, cried, " My 
Lord, I am sensible of the favour your lordship intends 
me, but cannot I go to heaven without all this ?" A 
shrewd question, and not foreign to the purpose ; for if 
the same ends may be obtained by easy and gentle 
measures which are proposed to be obtained by diffi- 
cult means, prudence requires us to choose the former. 
This exercise of discretion, as it appears in a wise 
jnan in the management of all his worldly affairs, will 



THE CHRISTIAN RELlGIOi\ &C. 197 

certainly nppear in religion ; and when he hath the 
whole of religion, all the ends to be obtained, and all 
the means proper to obtain them, he will be perfectly 
satisfied, and count every addition an incumbrance. 
Such were the sentiments of the apostle Paul in regard 
to the Christian religion, with this caution, that the 
Christian religion was not framed by man, and put to- 
gether by the discretion of a frail mortal ; but it was 
the prudence of God, that is to say, the wisdom of God 
applied to the practice of the duties of life. On this 
account he considers religion as a deposit, a religion 
committed to the care and trust of the apostles of Chr4st, 
and to be laid up in their writings without any altera- 
tion, for ihe use of Christians to the end of the world. 
" The glorious Gospel of the blessed God was commit- 
ted to my trust." In the same just and beautiful light 
he exhorts Timothy to consider himself, and in him ail 
other Christians, as put in trust, and holding what they 
held of the Christian religion, much or little, as trus- 
tees, who would be called to give an account. " O 
Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust." 

The virtue of a trustee is fidelity, a doctrine fully 
taught by our Saviour to his apostles. "He that is 
faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much ; 
and he that is unjust in the least, is unjust also in much. 
If therefore ve have not been faithful in the unrig-h- 
teous mammon, who v/ill commit to your trust the true 
riches ? And if ye have not been faithful in that which., 
is another man's, who shall give you that which is your 
own ?" This reasoning is very fair, and perfectly ap- 
plicable to our subject. The Christian religion is not 
ours ; the wisdom that designed it, the goodness that is 
displayed in it, the power which effects it, all belong 
to God. The Scriptures are not ours, the prophe- 
cies are his, the history is his, the promises, the com- 
mands, the ordinances, the threatenings, are all his, and 
we have nothing but the use of them. If we lose this 
just notion, and dispose of one part, the same principle 
will justify our disposal of another part : if we be " un- 
just in the least," we may be " unjust in the greatest" 
article, and so might dispose of the greatest and most 
17* 



} 98 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULfi NOT 

essential part of this divine relig-ion, and get rid of fh6 
Mediator himself. Our apostle thought the primitive 
church '•' a glorious church, not having spot, or wrin- 
kle, or any such thing, but holy and without blemish ;" 
and so it is in its constitution. Its doctrines are perfect, 
its practice complete, its power sufficient ; and on this 
principle he exhorted Timothy to " keep the good con- 
fession," which " Jesus Christ witnessed before Pontius 
Pilate, without spot, and unrebukable," until the ap- 
pearing of our Lord. When Pilate was trying Christ 
for his life, he asked him, " x4rt thou a king ?" To 
which Jesus replied, "• My kingdom is not of this world." 
This is the good confession, which Paul exhorted Tim- 
othy to " keep without spot," and he calls this confession 
a commandment ; for it included, as he expressed it a 
little before, '' righteousness, godliness, faith, love, pa- 
tience, meekness," and all the other virtues of a Chris- 
tian profession. 

The Christian religion stands distinguished from the 
Jewish dispensation in this respect. Religion among 
the Jews was performed with a great many ceremonies; 
and if a man would have shown his reverence of God 
in that country, he must have purchased beasts, and oth- 
er offerings, and sacrificed them in the temple devoted 
to that purpose ; if he would have dedicated his chil- 
dren to piety, he must have caused them to be circum- 
cised, and so of the rest : but religion as Jesus Christ 
taught it, is freed from all these ceremonies, and deliv- 
ered from a vast expense, a world of trouble, and a 
thousand occasions of sin. With a view, therefore, to 
preserve the Christian religion in this purity, Paul of- 
ten attacks, in his writings, a sort of Jews, who in the 
main approved of Christianity, but who thought it would 
appear less liable to censure, and to more advantage in 
the eyes of their countrymen, if it were administered 
as the religion of the Jews had been, for which too, 
they had the examples of Moses, and many other emi- 
nent men, whose names were honourably recorded in 
their genealogies. The apostle vehemently opposes 
this kind of men, and speaks even with contempt of the 
subject, which they wanted to incorporate with the in- 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 199 

stitutions of Christ; for they had added the traditions of 
the elders to the writings of Moses. Saith he, " Give 
no heed to fables, and endless genealogies ; refuse pro- 
fane and old wives' fables ; avoid doting about ques- 
tions, and strifes of words : shun profane and vain bab- 
blings, and foolish and unlearned questions; rebuke 
Jewish fables and commandments of men, and avoid 
contentions, and strivings about the law, for they are 
unprofitable and vain." Agreeably to all which he 
speaks in the text, " O Timothy, keep that which is 
committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain bab- 
blings, and oppositions of science, falsely so called; which 
some professing, have erred concerning the faith. 
Grace be with thee." 

It is not worth while to trouble you with what are 
said to be the " vain questions" of these men, nor with the 
" vain janglings," which were occasioned by them : but I 
shall address myself to the subject, as it concerns you ; 
and lest you should " err concerning the faith," I shall 
endeavour to convince you that the Christian religion 
should not be mixed with that of the Jews. It will be 
necessary to explain this subject, for the Jewish religion 
is a compound of religion itself, and the modes in which 
it was practised among the Jews : the first is Christian- 
ity, the last is Judaism. It will be further necessary to 
enforce our doctrine, and to show you the reasons why 
we say the Jewish religion ought not to be mixed with 
the Christian. God grant, we may " remember the 
words spoken by the apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ, 
and be built up in our most holy faith." 

1 divide the religion of the Jews into four parts, and 
by distinguishing these parts I explain our apostle, who 
expressly saith. Christians are " under the law," and 
Christians are " not under the law ;" understanding by the 
law the whole Jewish oeconomy, or disposition of things 
among that people before the coming of Jesus Christ. 

Observe, first, the Jews had a body of doctrine con- 
taining truths, first principles, or grounds on which the 
whole of their worship was built. These are the same 
doctrines as we have; and our doctrine only differs 
fi'om theirs as broad day light differs from twilight, or 



2t)t) THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

as a man differs from himself when he was a boy. Je- 
sus Christ placed all these doctrines in a light more 
clear, and more striking, than that in which the pro- 
phets had set them ; and for this reason " the appear- 
ing of our Saviour" is said to " make the purpose of 
God manifest," to " abolish death, and to bring life and 
immortality to light through the GospeL" 

The Jews believed one living and true God, a wise, 
a just, a kind, a powerful, an independent, an everlast- 
ing Being, who created the world, and all things there- 
in, and " before whom all nations were less than nothing 
and vanity." This is a first principle of the Christian 
religion, " for though there be that are called gods, 
whether in heaven or in earth, as there be gods many, 
and lords many, yet to us" Christians "there is but one 
God, the Father, of whom are all things, and we in 
him." 

The Jews believed the doctrine of Providence, the 
care of God to forecast, to direct, and to provide for all 
his creatures. In their history every thing is ascribed 
to God, and generally to God immediately, without tak- 
ing any notice of second causes, and means, by which he 
governed events. Thus Job saith, " The Lord hath 
taken away," though it was lightning that burnt his 
sheep, the Sabeans who stole his oxen, and a great wind 
which overset the house that killed his children by its 
fall. Thus an act ascribed in one place to God, is in 
another place attributed to Satan : one saith. The Lord 
moved David to number Israel : another saith, Satan 
provoked David to number Israel. In the same man- 
ner we are to expound the Lord's hardening the heart 
of Pharaoh, and many such places, agreeably to the 
true and real doctrine of Providence, as it lies in the 
Jewish Scriptures, in which God is made the first cause : 
" I have given you want of bread, I caused it to rain 
upon one city, and caused it not to rain upon another 
city. I have smitten you with blasting and mildew ; I 
have taken away your horses, the worm hath devoured 
your vineyards." How did I cause all this drought, in- 
sects, famine, and death? By "forming the mountains 
aad creating the wind," and at the creation, disposing 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 201 

the powers of nature so that they should produce these 
effects at an exact time, in an exact proportion ; and all 
which I foresaw, as you foresee, when you construct a 
machine, what it will do, and where, and when. This 
doctrine of Providence is a first principle in the Chris- 
tian religion; from the ravens and sparrows, lilies and 
grass, Jesus Christ hath taught us, that we, as v.ell as 
Israel, have a keeper, who will " neither slumber nor 
sleep, a shade to preserve us from all evil." 

The Jews had in their religion, in their prophecies, 
the doctrine, and in their ceremonies a pattern of the 
Mediator : hence they " died in faith, having seen the 
promises," and being persuaded of the truth of them so 
as to " embrace them, and confess that they were stran- 
gers and pilgrims on the earth." Hence the sufferings 
of Moses were esteemed by him afflictions for Christ. 
He knew God had promised, that " the seed of the wo- 
man should bruise the serpent's head," and that this ex- 
traordinary person should be of the tribe of Judah ; and 
he considered it necessary for him to submit to all the 
difficulties of bringing a people out of slavery, settling 
them in a land of their own, and giving them a religion 
to serve till the appearance of this person, the " prophet 
like unto himself," as introductory to this most desira- 
ble event. This Blediator is come, and to us is the 
good news sent. " Behold," said the angel to the shep- 
herds, " unto you is born a Saviour ; good tidings of 
great joy to all people." 

The Jews had also the same kind of law, or rule of 
action, as we have ; for they had a written revelation of 
the mind and will of God ; and by this they were oblig- 
ed to act in all cases of religion, and it was never safe, 
however good the intention, to act without it. David, 
full of riches, honour, and piety, observed that his own 
house was of cedar, while God was worshipped in a tent. 
He proposed to a prophet to build a temple for Divine 
worship; and the good prophet thought the Lord was 
with him, and bade him go, and do all that was in his 
heart. The principle was good; and even God said to 
him, " Thou didst well that it was in thine heart ;" but 
God would not suffer him to build the temple, for two 



202 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

reasons, the one because " he had been a man of war, 
and had shed blood ;" and the other because he acted 
without express order; and so his well-meant action 
would have subverted the great principle of all actions 
in a revealed religion, which is conducted by a set of 
servants under the direction, in writing, of one master, 
from whose precepts it is a crime to depart. " In all 
the places wherein I have walked with all the children 
of Israel, spake I a word to any of the judges of Israel, 
whom I commanded to feed my people, saying. Why 
build ye not me an house of cedar ? I have not dwelt 
in a house unto this day, but I have gone from tent to 
tent, and from one tabernacle to another. Go tell Da- 
vid, my servant," said the Lord to Nathan ; go and un- 
say what you have said ; you have been too complai- 
sant ; go tell David, " Thou shalt not build me an house. '^ 
This is the great rule of faith and practice in the Chris- 
tian church. The Lord Jesus came by commission 
from the Father ; the apostles acted by commission 
from him ; and they had from him no warrant to teach 
men to observe any thing except what he commanded 
them, and to teach " all things whatsoever he had com- 
manded." They accounted themselves only stewards, 
and required other men so to account of them, and with 
fidelity, which they declared was the chief virtue of a 
man in trust ; they "kept back nothing, but declared 
all the counsel of God." On this principle goes our 
text, which is the language of an apostle to a private 
Christian ; so I call Timothy, to distinguish him from 
those public characters, the apostles, who were inspir- 
ed to write the Gospel for the use of Timothy, Titus, 
Philemon, Theophilus, and other uninspired Christians. 
Our doctrines, then, were those of the Jews ; but with 
this difference, we have the same truths in a higher 
state of improvement. 

A second part of the Jewish religion was morality ; 
that is, the doctrine of the duties of life. We have of- 
ten observed to you, that all religious duties, the per- 
formance of which is called morality, are contained in 
these words of the apostle Paul, " Live soberly your- 
selves, live righteously with your neighbours, live 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OP THE JEWS. 203 

godly towards your Maker." These are the three 
branches into which the duties of life divide ; and these 
were so necessary to the Jews, that their prophets not 
only dissuaded them from idolatry, because idolatry was, 
so to speak, a wicked religion, or rather wickedness 
under the name of religion ; but they reprobated the 
ceremonies of their own religion, when the perform- 
ance of them was not accompanied with pure morality : 
" he that killeth an ox is as if he slew a man ; he that 
burneth incense as if he blessed an idol." Why ? What 
makes idolatry and Divine ordinances, murder and sa- 
crifice, alike ? Because the worshippers " do evil be- 
fore mine eyes, and choose that in which I delight not, 
saith the Lord." Morality is the glory of the Chris- 
tian religion ; and though that of the Jews is incorpo- 
rated, every branch of it, into our religion, and makes 
a principal part of it, yet it is in a state far more refin- 
ed than it was among- the Jews. I need not enlarge on 
this article, because each may fully inform himself, by 
reading the Sermon of our Lord upon the Mount, la 
which he saith, " I am not come to destroy the law, but 
to fulfil ;" that is, to explain and enforce it. " Ye 
have heard, that it was said by them of old time, Thou 
shalt not kill ; but I say unto you. Thou shalt not be an- 
gry. Ye have heard that it was said by them of old 
time. Thou shalt not forswear thyself; but I say unto 
you. Swear not all. Ye have heard that it hath been 
said. Thou shalt love thy neighbour ; but I say unto you, 
Love your enemies." The morality of the Jewish reli- 
gion was the same with ours, only not in such a high 
degree of improvement. The Old Testament resem- 
bles a goodly tree in full blossom in the spring ; the 
New Testament, the same tree loaded with all its mel- 
low fruits in autumn. 

The third part of the Jewish religion is experience, 
and this also is incorporated into Christianity, and im- 
proved by it. By experience I mean those effects which 
the truths of religion produce in the heart. It must be 
granted there were many truths and many events in the 
Jewish religion adapted to give pleasure and pain, and 
the pious Jews had great experiments tried among them 



£04 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

to make a discovery, to themselves and to others, of 
the good or bad state of their hearts. Had we nothing 
but the book of Psalms, we might trace all the affections 
and passions, desires and aversions, joys and sorrows, 
hopes and fears, anger, shame, and sense of honour, 
with all their various objects, and with all their keea 
emotions, which Christians feel ; but the book of Psalms 
is exactly framed as the rest of the Old Testament is ; 
and there lies the human heart open to public view, in 
an extreme of joy, as in the Song of Moses, and in an 
extreme of sorrow, as in the Lamentations of Jeremiah. 
" Behold and see, if there be any sorrow like to my 
sorrow !" Yes, there is a sorrow in the New Testa- 
ment like your sorrow, and as far beyond it as love to 
the whole world is beyond your love to your country ; 
and there is a joy as far beyond the joy of Moses, as the 
salvation of a world from everlasting misery is beyond 
the salvation of one nation from the cruelty of Pharaoh : 
there is an union between the joys and sorrows of the 
two Testaments, for they were both just, and all the 
saints unite to sing " the song of Moses,^' and " the song 
of the Lamb," the one " the servant of God," and the 
other " the King of saints." 

Observe the truths taught in both the churches, as the 
being of a God, the care of Providence, the salvation of 
sinners from punishment through a mediator, the influ- 
ences of the Holy Spirit on the dreams, visions, minds, 
and hearts of inspired men, a future state of rewards 
and punishments, a judgment to come, and a restitution 
of all things ; and you will at once see, that information 
of this kind cannot but affect, and very much affect the 
hearts of men, and the hearts of those most, who have 
the happiness to live under the clearest instruction. 
Observe the events^ which took place under both the 
dispensations, the calling of Abraham from idolatry to 
the worship of the true God, the calling of the Gentiles 
to imitate his example, the various fortunes of the fami- 
ly of the Patriarch, and the various prosperous and ad- 
verse events of the apostles, and all the succeeding 
Christians; sometimes "strangers in a strange land," 
and at other times " preparing cities of their own for hab- 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 205 

ilation." Observe the appearance, and miracles, and 
death of Moses, and other great men ; and the birth and 
life, the miracles and death, the resurrection and ascen- 
sion of Jesus Christ. Consider the " backsliding" of the 
Jews, and the "falling away" of Christians; the cruelty of 
Nebuchadnezzar, the generosity of Cyrus, the captivity 
of the Jews, the rigour of some tyrants of the Christian 
church, the clemency of some princes towards it, the 
severity of God, and the distresses of his people ; the 
restoration of the Jews, and the reformation of Chris- 
tians, with the Vianj'-, many thousands of events, which 
are always taking place in the religious world by the 
conversion of some, and the glorification of others. Ob- 
serve how all these events interweave themselves with 
the best and dearest interests of mankind; I say, sum up 
all the truths of religion, and all the events produced by 
it, and then tell me, whether religion can be in the 
world without producing the most lively feelings in the 
hearts of mankind ? How is it possible, that this de- 
claration, " God so loved the world that he gave his on- 
ly begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him, 
should not perish, but have everlasting life ;" how is it 
possible this truth should lie in the world as cold as this 
other. Two and two make four ? The Jewish religion 
had a share of pleasure and pain in proportion to the 
truths and events of their times ; Christians know what 
happened to them, and a thousand truths and events, of 
which they never heard ; and consequently their pains 
are more acute, and their pleasures more delicious. A 
sober, decent man feels pain and pleasure at the sight of 
gross wickedness, and eminent virtue ; but how his 
pains and pleasures magnify and multiply when he be- 
comes a Christian ! 

The fourth part of the Jewish religion is its form of 
government^ and this is the great difference between 
their religion and ours, and the difference is amazingly 
to our advantage. Nothing can be so necessary to ena- 
ble a Christian to read the Old Testament to edification, 
as a clear notion of this part of our subject ; for it is re- 
markable that, amidst a great number of quotations from 
the Old Testament by the writers of the '^ew. there is; 
18 



206 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

not a single passage quoted as a rule of church govern- 
ment. Should a Christian think it right to introduce 
any thing into the worship of God because the Old Tes- 
tament told him the Jews did so and so, we should think 
him, perhaps, a well-meaning man, but not well instruct- 
ed in his own religion ; we should think him wanting iu 
this great branch of religious knowledge ; the differ- 
ence, and the reasons of the difference, between a 
Christian and a Jew. 

The Jewish church was national, and all the females 
were members of it by birth, and all the males were 
admitted members at eight days old by circumcision ; 
but the Christian church consists of only believers ; and 
no person can be properly admitted a member of it but 
by a profession of faith and repentance ; and every per- 
son making such a profession hath a right from the Lord 
of the church to all the benehts of his community. 

The Jewish church was confined to the little country 
of Judea; but the Christian church is of all countries, 
and in Jesus Christ, '' whether we be Jews or Gentiles, 
bond or free, we are all baptized by one spirit into one 
body." 

The men who officiated in the Jewish worship were 
a distinct order, of one family, and on account of their 
attendance on the worship of God, were supported by a 
tax on the people ; their persons were held sacred, and 
their presence necessary to every act of public wor- 
ship ; but the worship of Christians consists only of 
prayer and praise ; and any Christian who is able, may 
be a mouth for the rest ; and as to public instruction, any 
person who can, may give it, provided he have the 
consent of his brethren ; for they who officiate in the 
Christian church are not a separate family, or what is 
the same, a distinct order, multiplying and continuing 
themselves by acts of adoption ; nor are they sacred 
persons under any of the solemnities of unction ; but 
Christians may elect whom they please to preside in 
their assemblies, to instruct, and to administer ordinan- 
ces, and all under the great law, '^ Freely ye have re- 
ceived, freely give. Provide no gold, for the workman 
is worthy of his meat." 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 



207 



The religion of the Jews was splendid and costly :. 
but the worship of Christians is neat, clean, and plain : 
nothing but prayer is necessary to prayer, and '' where 
two or three are gathered together in the name of 
Christ, there is he in the nrndst of them." 

The spirit and temper of the Jews, like the econom}^ 
under which they lived, was stern, sour, and tending to 
servility; and if we compare the good done in the 
world, and the temper in doing it, of our one apostle 
Paul, with those of the most famous of their kings, even 
Solomon himself, the comparison will be greatly in fa- 
vour of the apostle. The most glorious day of Solo- 
mon's life was that on which he dedicated the temple, 
and offered up, amidst a vast multitude of people, and 
more sacrifices than the altar could contain, that fine 
prayer recorded in Scripture ; but glorious as this was, 
it was the prayer of a Jew, and Israel, Israel in their 
various conditions of prosperity and adversity, Israel is 
all he thinks of. Our apostle, who had "the love of 
God shed abroad in his heart by the Holy Ghost given 
unto him," had a soul that contained the whole world, 
and after he had done good enough to content a com- 
mon man, laid out more and more noble plans to be ex- 
ecuted for the benefit of mankind ; all his writings and 
history are full of this. He sails into Syria, arrives at 
Ephesus, proceeds to CaBsarea, goes down to Antioch, 
all over the country of Galatia and Phrygia, purposes 
in spirit to pass through Macedonia, and Achaia, goes 
to Jerusalem, saying, '' After I have been there, I must 
see Rome also." Paul was thirty-four years a Chris- 
tian, two and twenty years of which time we have little 
or no account of, and almost ail the great works done 
by him, and recorded in Acts, are the services of only 
ten or twelve years : but it is not imaginable, that such 
a man spent two and twenty years in idleness ; but if 
they were spent like the other twelve, " in journeying 
often, in perils of waters, in perils of robbers, in perils 
by his own countrymen, in perils by the heathen, in 
perils in the city, in perils in the wilderness, in perils 
among false brethren, in stripes, in prisons, in deaths 
oft, in hunger and thirst, and cold and nakedness, with 



208 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGIOJiT SHOULD NOT 

the care of all the churches," and with a heart full of 
i^eal and humanity, saying', " Who is weak and I am not 
weak? Who is offended and I burn not?" — I say, if 
Paul did all this in a spirit of benevolence to mankind, 
and if I must needs glory in a man, it is not Solomon, 
but Paul ; for, in my eye, Solomon in all his glory was 
not such an ornament to the world as this one apostle. 
Thus let us understand the religion of the two 
Testaments, which, strictly speaking, is but one religion, 
though diiferently administered ; and let us learn how 
to read and apply the Holy Scriptures, so as to avoid 
what the apostle calls " profane and vain babblings" 
about the law, and " oppositions" of pretended " science" 
to obstruct the free course of that perfection of beauty, 
the Christian dispensation. 

There are many ways of doing this. Should we ap- 
ply the Jewish " science" of admitting members into the 
Christian church, we should '^ oppose" the design of Jesus 
Christ, which was to form his church of wise and good 
men, not of infants and proiligates ; for it was written 
in the Prophets^, concerning the Christian church, 
" They shall all be taught of God, every man therefore, 
that hath heard, and hath learned of the Father," and no 
other man, " cometh unto Christ." Our Saviour will not 
lose his dignity by stooping to take infants at surprise ; 
nor will he make his church " the hold of every foul 
spirit," and "a cage of every unclean and hateful bird." 

Should the Jewish " science" of office be applied to the 
Christian religion, it would '' oppose" the holy purpose of 
Jesus Christ, which was not to create offices of dignity, 
emolument, ease, and dominion, to tire the ambition, and 
stir up the worldly passions of his followers ; but so to 
arrange his institutions as not to tempt men to the exer- 
cise of such unw orthy dispositions. He meant to make 
them a family of love, and intended to show the world 
that love could do more kind offices, than wealth and 
honour, fondness for ease, or love of power. When his 
disciples so far forgot his instructions as to ask him, 
*' Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven ; he 
called a little child unto him, and set him in the midst 
ef them." What a lesson, a great lesson for the twelve 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 209 

most wise and able men in all the kingdom ! One evan- 
gelist says, he '' took him in his arms ;" another says, 
he set him "by him." Probably he did both these 
while he discoursed on the subject ; for he said, " Ex- 
cept ye become as little children, ye shall not enter into 
the kingdom of heaven ;" and "whosoever shall humble 
himself as this little child, the same is greatest in the 
kingdom heaven." The church of- the Jews was a 
" kingdom of priests," and therefore in some ages a 
kingdom of pride ; but the kingdom of Christ was in- 
tended to be a kingdom of virtue ; and in such a king- 
dom, modesty and humility are the ground work of the 
whole. 

Should any apply the Jewish " science" of ceremonies 
to the Christian religion, and pretend to set off the ser- 
vice, and attract the eyes of fine folks in the world, they 
would " oppose" the wise design of Jesus Christ, which 
was to supply the wants of the poor with the goods of 
the church. When he had probably only a little, he 
had a purse for the poor..^ Though his disciples admir- 
ed " the goodly stones and gifts" which " adorned the 
temple," he said, " As for these things," they will soon 
be destroyed ; but here is one thing far more worthy 
your attention, her.e is a poor widow casting two mites 
into the treasury, she hath cast in more than all the 
rich men. When he comes to judgment, he will take 
notice of that money, which shall have been employed 
in ministering to the necessities of the wretched; but 
as to music and paintings, and habits, and fme things, 
they ill assort with the religion of a poor man, who had 
not where to lay his head, w^ho was crucified on a cross, 
and whose sincere followers have generally been an 
*' afBicted and poor people," to use the language of a 
prophet, " a flock of slaughter, whose possessers slay 
them, and hold themselves not guilty, sell them, and 
say. Blessed be the Lord, for I am rich." Into two ex- 
tremes, both contrar}^ to the spirit of Christianity, this 
" science" leads people. They who can afford it, " op- 
pose" the humility of Christ by a profusion of grandeur, all 
inconsistent with " the simplicity of Christ." They who 
cannot, " oppose" the dignity of Christ by applying in his 
18* 



210 TifE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD N6t 

worship a kind of dirty, cast-off finery ; thus a Greek 
Bishop, who pretended he could not perform public wor-* 
ship without a crucifix, and not being able to procure 
one, contrived to make one on the spot with two bits of 
broken lath, as if the God he adored had been a finical 
being of small understanding and great ostentation. 

Should any apply the " science^' of the spirit of the Jew- 
ish religion to that of Jesus Christ, it would " oppose" the 
chief excellence of Christianity, benevolence, and uni- 
versal love : it would gather up all the Prophecies, the 
four Gospels, and all the wonderful gifts bestowed upon 
men, into a little machine made to serve the sordid views 
often or twenty men, to the loss and ruin of ten times 
so many millions. If the Jews in their confined dispen- 
sation were taxed with the sin of '' limiting the Holy 
One of Israel," how much guilt must lie upon Christians, 
if they presume to inclose, within the narrow lines of 
their own parties, mercy of evangelical magnitude! 

Such in general are the reasons why we should not 
confound Christianity with Judaism, the New Testa- 
ment with the Old, the teachers of the Christian reli- 
gion with Aaron and the Levites, Baptism and the 
Lord's supper with circumcision and the passover, the 
laws of a state with the rules of an assembly gathered 
together only for the purpose of worshipping God : but 
as these reasons are only general, we will give you a 
few particulars. 

The folly of mixing these religions will appear by 
four considerations. One is, that it implies two great 
errors ; the imperfections of that Christianity, which 
Christ and his apostles taught and practised ; and the 
rio-ht of Christians to alter religion, and accommodate it 
to their worldly convenience. If there be a truth clear 
and self-evident, it is that Jesus Christ was perfect, and 
that his introducing a more perfect religion than that of 
the Jews had been foretold by the prophets, and that 
his perfection was manifest in all he said and did. 
Neither his understanding nor his memory ever failed 
him; he forgot no orders, and did nothing by halves. 
Every thing he said was so proper, that nothing could 
be added, and tjie whole of his ministry may be likened 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OP THE JEWS. 211 

lo any one of his miracles, to which the skill and power 
of man conld add nothing. He made the blind see, he 
caused the dead to live ; the universe could do no more, 
the universe could not do so much. Far be it from us 
to consider Jesus Christ in the light of a teacher of let- 
ters, who indeed teaches the first principles of reading, 
but who is at an amazing distance from a complete 
scholar. Beside, the same arguments that maintain the 
right of one man to alter religion, will convey a right to 
all men ; and thus we should have all masters, and no 
servants in the Christian church. The miser would ac- 
commodate religion to his love of money ; the proud 
man to his love of show ; the angry man to his love of 
vengeance ; and thus the holy one of God would be 
'' the minister of sin," an office he never intended to 
execute, and the thought of which made an apostle cry, 
" God forbid !" It was this scandalous perversion of 
religion that made God complain of the Jews, " Thou 
hast made me to serve with thy sins. Behold I am 
pressed under you, as a cart is pressed that is full of 
sheaves." How foolish to practise any thing that im- 
plies such odious errors ; any thing that casts such un- 
just imputations upon the character of a Saviour, who 
deserves other treatment at our hands ! 

How void of understanding must we be, to put our- 
selves to so much trouble and charge to do that in reli- 
gion, which would be as well, and better done without 
it ! Let me propose a plain question to you. It is com- 
monly observed, that when gentlemen of rank take their 
farms into their own hands, the}^ get less than their ten- 
ants can afford to ^ay to occupy them. Why? You 
know. It is because they do every thing like gentle- 
men at a greater expense than tiusbandry will pay ; and 
their true prudence would be either not to take the 
character of a hushandman, or to submit to the plainness 
of it. What would you say to a siiver-hafted sickle, a 
scythe with a mahogany handle, a gilt shock fork, a 
rope of silk, and an ivor}^ flail ? There is a propriety 
in every thing; and religion is as proper in its means 
as it is in its end ; and when the means answer the end, 
all additions are waste and folly. It is said, there was 



212 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

a g-entleman, who would never presume to say his 
prayers before he was full dressed in his best clothes. 
Do you think God attended more to what he said on 
that account? If a man can be as wise and good 
without the incumbrance of Jewish ceremonies as with 
them, I think every prudent man would prefer the plain 
before the pompous, the doing of a little well and 
thoroughly, and as it ought to be done, before the under- 
taking of a large concern, which, peradventure he might 
never get through. The Jews " laboured and were 
heavy laden," and Jesus Christ said to them, " Come 
unto me, take my yoke upon you, my yoke is easy, and 
I will give you rest." 

The folly of this mixture appears by the best reason 
given for it, that is, that Judaism strikes the senses and 
tlie passions, and so makes way for religion to the heart. 
Alas ! Did you never hear how the Jews lost, in the 
purest ages of ceremony, the very doctrine of one God, 
and went into the worship of idols ? Did you never 
hear that traditions •' made the word of God of none ef- 
fect?" Did you never hear to what this mixture hath 
brought the once famous church of Rome, to suffer " a 
man of sin, the son of perdition to exalt himself above 
all that is called God, so that he as God sitteth in the 
temple of God ?" This was not brought about by avoiding 
Jewish " science ;" but by " forbidding to marry, com» 
manding to abstain from meats," by incorporating Jewish 
customs with the Christian religion. There was a prof- 
ligate gamester, whose converson was attempted by 
some honest monks, and they in order to break his heart 
for sin, put into his hands a fine picture of the crucitix- 
ion of Christ; but when they inquired what he was stu- 
dying so intently in the picture, hoping his conversion 
was going forward, he replied, I was examining wheth- 
er the dice, with which the soldiers are casting lots for 
the gnrment, be like ours. This man too well resem- 
bles bad men in the ceremonies of religion, and their 
hearts guide their eyes to what nourish their vices, not 
to what would destroy them. 

Finally, the folly of this mixture will appear by mak- 
ing persecution necessary. The Jews with Herod for a 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 213 

king, and Caiaphas for a priest, with Pilate in courts of 
law, and Sadducees " akin to the High Priest" in the ar- 
my and in the temple, could maintain traditions by force, 
which could never have stood in the w^orld one day by 
argument : but you, an unarmed man, what can you do 
in a church broke loose from tyranny, and chartered in 
freedom by Jesus Christ ! If you were an emperor in 
an age of ignorance, you might kill and slay; but in 
your condition you can do only a little of that kind of 
work, which brought Jesus Christ to the cross. Like 
the poor Jews you may show your ill-will by envy, by 
" putting forth the finger," by '' wagging the head," by 
saying, " Aha, so would I have it," by crjang, '' The 
man of God is an hairy man, and girt with a girdle of 
leather about his loins," by turning good men into ridi- 
cule, and by " slanderously reporting. They say. Let us 
do evil that good may come." Persecution, you see, is 
a Jewish practice, and shedding of blood was a " science" 
in which that people was too well instructed ; to kill 
" a lion in a pit in the time of snow," to " slay two lion- 
like men of Moab," to deprive " a goodly Egyptian" of 
his life " with his own spear," was to obtain among the 
Jews an honourable name, though to destroy " eight 
hundred at a time was more honourable" still. It is not 
only the poor Jews, and the officers of their armies, but 
their pious kings, and even Moses himself, who are not 
to assume the honour of guiding Christians, either in 
religion, that peaceable profession, or in war that some- 
times necessary occupation. Should Moses enter this 
door, inform us that some people were worshipping a 
calf, and say to you, " Put every man his sword by his 
side, and go slay every man his brother, and every man 
jiis companion, and every man his neighbour;" say unto 
3^our father and mother, " I have not seen you ; do not 
acknowledge your brethren, nor know your own chil- 
dren ;" dare you do what the Levites did, and kill your 
family and friends to the number of " three thousand ?" 
The only apology that can be made for these men, is, 
they acted by commission from God, the sovereign dis- 
poser of all events; but this brings us back to the point, 
and turns the balance in favour of Moses and David. 



214 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

The Jews acted punctually according to the orders they 
recelved from heaven: "go,-' you Christians, " and do 
likewise," "keep that which is committed to your 
trust," and avoid the practice of a " science" which you 
have not been taught. 

Let us finish b}^ observing the sin of mixing two dis- 
pensations so opposite. The Jews, though they had a 
commission from heaven, sometimes discovered a reluc- 
tance to comply with it. How many objections did Mo- 
ses make against understanding the service, to which 
God appointed him ? " Who am I that I should go un- 
to Pharaoh ?" . , . Behold when I come unto the children 
of Israel, they will say to me. What is God's name ? 
What shall I say unto them ? . . . Behold they will not 
believe me, for they will say. The Lord hath not appear- 
ed unto thee . . . O my Lord, I am not eloquent . . . O my 
Lord, send, I pray thee, by the hand of him whom thou 
wilt send." He foresaw the difficulties, and trembled 
at the work, he was going about. He could not be 
brought to circumcise his own son, till the Lord threat- 
ened " to kill him :" but we uncalled, rush into that at 
which a Moses shuddered. Probably he examined his 
own heart, and was afraid to undertake the services of 
religion without the purest principles ; but we from 
principles the most base, not only undertake to perform 
religious duties, but to prescribe them. Moses required 
in himself refined principles to undertake an imperfect 
religion ; but we with depravity in an extreme, rush 
into a perfect dispensation to pollute it. "We leave 
the paths of uprightness, to walk in the ways of dark- 
ness." To such principles our apostle ascribes the pro- 
fane babblings in the text 

" Give no heed to Jewish fables," for " some desiring 
to be teachers of the law, understand not what they say 
nor whereof they affirm." Ignorance is a misfortune, 
wilful ignorance is a crime, and this crime is exceed- 
ingly aggravated by a pretence of teaching what we do 
not understand. It is not enough that we understand the 
world and religion as well as our neighbours; a man, 
who presumes to make religion of that, which Jesus 
Christ and his apostles never recommended, ought to 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 25l| 

understand it better than they did. If any thing can ag- 
gravate the guilt of such a man more, it is his own 
creed. Who are you ? I am a sinful, frail man, " of 
yesterday, and know nothing." No, you are not a sin- 
ful, frail man, knowing nothing ; you are another " Sol- 
omon, wiser than all men ! Behold thou art wiser than 
Daniel ; there is no secret hidden from thee ! Thou 
hast been in Eden, the garden of God ! Thou art the 
anointed cherub ! Thou sealest up the sum full of wis- 
dom, and art perfect in beauty ! Thou hast set thine 
heart as the heart of God !" If you are not such a per- 
son, how dare you undertake what made Moses shiver ! 
Ignorance dare do what inspiration trembles at ! 

If a man ''• dote about" Jewish questions, " he is proud." 
What sin less becomes a fallen man than pride ? On 
what can he ground his inordinate esteem of himself? 
Above all, what an absurd sin is pride in regard to reli- 
gion, especially to the Christian religion, which was never 
intended to feed the vanity of man ? To be '' lifted up 
with pride," in the apostle's account, is to " fall into the 
condemnation of the devil." Survey the whole Chris- 
tian religion, and wonder what there is in it to nourish 
the pride of man. A Saviour, born in a stable, brought 
up by plain parents, in a homely occupation, a compan- 
ion of fishermen, tried like a criminal for his life, cruci- 
fied like a slave, followed ^like one of his ancestors, by 
one in distress, another in debt, a third discontented, a 
people '' hated of all nations for his name's sake ;" is 
there any thing in all this to gratify pride ? Examine 
the doctrines of Christianity, which all unite to sa}^, 
" No flesh shall glory in the presence of God." Ob- 
serve the duties of Christians, '' to follow Christ, to deny 
themselves, to take up crosses, to lose life, lo give the 
whole world in exchange for the soul." All mortify- 
ing; all attacks upon pride. Hear the devotions of 
Christians, all expressive of their own meanness and de- 
pravity ; all Christians at prayer are in the condition 
of criminals throwing themseves upon the clemency of 
their judge. Examine Christians in their intercourse 
with the world. Their conversation is plain and direct, 
yea yea, nay nay ; they cannot swear ; they dare not 



2115 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION SHOULD NOT 

slander, they must not speak falsely, they are bound by 
their religion to be '' blameless and harmless in the 
midst of a perverse nation," that is to say, they are 
doomed, among all classes of bad men, to be '•' defamed 
as the filth of the world and the off-scouring of all 
things." What can a proud man do with all this ? He 
hath not the virtue and wisdom to resign his pride for 
the sake of religion, and therefore he must accommo- 
date his religion to his vanity ; and the most plausible 
way is to call in the aid of Jewish ''science," and clothe 
Jesus the son of Joseph in the glorious habits of Aaron. 
If the plain Virgin Mary can be converted into a bless- 
ed lady, if the apostles can be canonized, and Peter the 
fisherman, and Paul of Tarsus, called in to settle a point 
in philosophy ; if the doctrines of Christ can be accom- 
modated to the dispositions of bad men ; if the whole 
Christian religion be converted into a secular policy fit 
for armies, and navies, and all sorts of men to make 
their fortune by; then will the offence of the cross 
cease, and pride will condescend to walk in procession 
with the people of God. Cruelty will become an ad- 
vocate for God, and will " make a decree, that every 
people, who speak any thing amiss against him, shall be 
cut in pieces, and their houses made a dunghill, because 
there is no other God that can do after this sort . . ." 
feigned, " Nebuchadnezzar the king." 

What we have said of ignorance and pride, we might 
repeat again of envy, love of money, youthful lusts, and 
several other vicious dispositions, to which our apostle 
attributes the teaching of Jewish fables. Let us en- 
deavour to apply that general remedy to all those ills, 
which the apostle suggests. Let us so live as not to 
render " filthy lucre," or gain unjustly gotten, necessary 
to our living, and less still to our religion. Let us be 
ambitious to recommend it by a holy life, which is an 
argument that goes home to an honest heart, and not by 
the fine habits of the ancient Jews, which often served 
only to cover the most dangerous and destructive dis- 
positions. In this manner the mouths of unruly talkers 
must be stopped. In one word, he who lives by no rule 
is a heathen 5 he who lives by the Old Testament is a 



BE MIXED WITH THAT OF THE JEWS. 217 

Jew ; and he only is a Christian who makes the New 
Testament the rule of his faith and practice, the prom- 
ises the ground of his hope, and the precepts the rule 
of his action. God grant us this grace ! To him be 
honour and glory forever. Amen. 



19 



DISCOUESE XII. 

CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY TO SUCH AS GfVE 
CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 

l^T FULBOURNE.^ 



MARK ii, 1. 

And it was noised that he was in the house. 

When our Saviour described a holy life under the si- 
militude of a road leading to heaven, he called it a nar- 
row way., because a holy life is made up of a set of just 
and proper actions exactly performed between two ex- 
tremes. This is the case of all virtue in general ; but 
there are some duties more difficult than others through 
the strength of temptations to extremes. The case be- 
fore us is of this kind. " Jesus entered into Caperna- 
um" to avoid the multitude ; " but it was noised that he 
was in the house." On the one hand, Jesus Christ was 
a person so necessary to the city, that the citizens 
might have thought themselves obliged to any person, 
in any way to give notice of his coming ; and as the 
crowing of a cock was a signal to Peter to repent, and a 
little necessary link in the chain of events, which com- 
posed the life of that great man, so sometimes little, 
and seemingly ridiculous, causes are connected with, and 
bring about great events. On the other hand, Jesus 
Christ had so much right to retirement, that he ought 



CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY, &C. 219 

iiot have been interrupted, when he desired to be alone, 
and he was a person of so much dignity and propriety 
of conduct, and in general his true character so little 
known, even by his own neighbours, that it should seem 
dangerous to spread reports about him. Shall we cen- 
sure the citizens for ''noising it that he was in the 
house V But the rumour collected the multitude, and 
produced an instructive sermon and a miracle. Shall 
we commend all the rumours that were spread about ? 
But they produced great inconveniences, and rendered 
the access of the most distressed impossible without " un- 
covering the roof, and letting the sick of the palsy down 
through the tiling with his couch into the midst before 
Jesus," while some unworthy " Scribes, and doctors of 
the law," who had " come out of every town of Galilee 
and Judea and Jerusalem," perhaps on a party of pleas- 
ure, were sitting by at their ease, though they thought 
the speaker uttering blasphemy. Let us neither ap- 
prove all, nor censure all ; but let us try to make a just 
separation, and on the whole adore that God, who, 
though he denounceth a " wo unto them that call evil 
good, and good evil ; that put darkness for light, and 
light for darkness," yet knows how to " command 
light to shine out of darkness," and " to give the light 
of the glorious Gospel of Christ" to a world blinded by 
unbelief and prejudice. 

Jesus had a little before cleansed a leper, and had 
commanded him to ''show himself to the priest, and 
offer the gift for his cleansing, which Moses command- 
ed," and " he charged him to tell no other man." No- 
thing could be' more proper than this conduct ; for the 
leper could ascertain the fact of his cleansing to the 
priest : but probably he was not sufficiently instructed 
to describe the character of his benefactor. The man 
did not enter into these views; but " out he went, and 
began to publish it much, and to blaze abroad the mat- 
ter," and perhaps thought he did much good ; but the 
event was, " Jesus could no more openly enter into the 
city, but withdrew himself into the wilderness and pray- 
ed." So Moses, after the people had made and wor- 
shipped a calf, said unto them, " Ye have sinned a great 



220 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

sin ; and now I will go up unto the Lord, peradventure I 
shall make an atonement for your sin." He v.ent, and 
said, " Oh, Lord, this people have sinned a great sin, 
yet now forgive their sin, and if not, bl'ot me, I pray 
thee, out of thy book !" 

" After some days," when the hubbub was over, Je- 
sus returned home, " and it was noised that he was in 
the house," and the consequences were, as we have al- 
ready observed, very beneficial to some, and very in- 
convenient to others ; but I am going to apply the sub- 
ject to ourselves, in order to determine the conduct of 
some good men in regard to the imprudences of other 
good men. There are 3^et confused accounts of Jesus 
Christ, and as we ought not to give up our understand- 
ings so as not to know truth from error, so neither ought 
we to lose the command of our tempers, and to defend 
the cause of Christianity with "the instruments of a 
foolish shepherd." May that God, who hath given us 
an exact standard of truth, and a perfect rule of action 
in the Holy Scriptures, grant us " wisdom to discern be- 
tween good and evil," and preserve his church from that 
confusion, which renders it difficult to "discern the 
noise of the shout of joy, from the noise of the weeping 
of the people !" 

I will not attempt to conceal my design, but will avail 
m3''self of the liberty you always allow me of using great 
plainness of speech. I hope I shall never so far forget 
the respect due to you as to abuse such an indulgence. 
When in teaching I interfere with any thing beside re- 
ligion, reprove me, and I will be silent; but when reli- 
gion is concerned, allow me to " know no man after the 
flesh." I am going to show you . . . that many sincere 
persons spread false reports about Jesus Christ . . . that 
though they often do a great deal of harm, yet some- 
times they do good . . . and that in this state of things, 
which we cannot alter, our wisdom lies in bearing with 
the evil, and promoting the good. 

You will readily allow, that all we know of Christ is 
by report of those, who were " eye-witnesses of his 
majesty." Their whole report is contained in the New 
Testament, and the world hath no more intelligence of 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 221 

him since the canon of Sciipture was closed, signed 
with the hands, sealed with the hlood of the reporters, 
and " contirmed every where" by its elTects, or, as an 
Evangelist expresseth it, "with signs following." We 
know nothing of this report but by reading it, compar- 
ing one part of it with another, and so forming a just 
judgment of the whole. Sincerity is a necessary quali- 
lication, no doubt ; but unless an honest intention be ac- 
companied with a sound understanding, we may suppose 
we understand the whole report, when indeed we un- 
derstand only a part. To understand only a part is a 
qualification to make a true report of that part ; but an 
attempt to report the whole of what we know only in 
part, is like pretending to draw an exact picture of a 
man, of whom we had seen no part except one of his 
fingers. Should I cut out of the Bible two or three 
leaves of the life of Moses, or David, or Christ, and give 
them to a stranger for the whole life of the person, I 
should act exactly like the people, whose conduct we 
are reproving. What can a man know of Scripture by 
a few single detached passages ; or what can that man 
know of the whole of Jesus Christ, who never considers 
him except in the moment of his crucifixion ? So far as 
we understand^ so far we may report ; but all the rest 
is conjecture, it may be, and it may not be, and in our 
depraved condition it is most likely our conjectures 
about such a person as Jesus Christ should not be true. 
To partiality therefore, and not to malice ; to a sincere 
desire to favour the cause, mixed with inattention, prej- 
udice of education, and such things, we attribute the 
giving of confused accounts of Jesus. 

How sadly have some confused the Scriptural account 
of- the nuture and government of God ! His nature 
hath been (pardon the word, I cannot think just now 
of a better), anatomized^ and laid open by curious dissec- 
tions into distinct parts called persons, and many rash 
things have been said on the subject. 

The government of God, too, hath been all laid out in 

the same confused manner, and is daily so stated by 

teachers, most of whose divinity lies before the first 

chapter in Genesis, and who, as if there were music ia 

19* 



g22 CHRISTIANS SHOtTLD BEHAVE PROPERtY 

the words, begin and end, and ring perpetual changes 
on, " From everlasting to everlasting." The Father in 
council was angry, the Son was mild ; the Father pro- 
posed a plan, the Son agreed to submit to it, and the 
Holy Ghost acceded, and became a party, and so a cov- 
enant of grace was formed for the salvation of man ; 
as if it were possible for Almighty God to have a pause, 
a difficulty, a second thought, or to need an assistant ; 
as if such similitudes as were taken from contracts among 
men, to let down a great subject into the little mind of 
children of men, could possibly be applied literally and 
properly to him, who is necessarily '•'• exalted above all 
blessing and praise." God hath been supposed to gov- 
ern the far greater part of this world, and at some times 
the whole of it, by the ministry of an innumerable mul- 
titude of devils, to whom fancy hath given form, shape, 
and colour, and whom custom hath so habituated us to 
consider under the idea of black, that we have no sus- 
picion of danger from white and red, or from pride and 
envy. This convenient being serves all sorts of purpo- 
ses, and hath found his way even into our laws ; for an 
indictment must run, that such an one " not having the 
fear of God before his eyes, but being moved and seduc- 
ed by the instigation of the devil," did so and so. The 
dexterity of some Christians in the use of this doctrine 
is wonderful. Do they sin ? It was not they, the devil 
tempted them. Do they fear the effects of sin after 
having committed it, and doubt their own piety ? It is 
not the natural effect of their conduct, but an extraor- 
dinary and unexpected suggestion of the devil. Let us 
entertain more sober notions, and more agreeable to the 
real doctrine of that very figurative book, the Bible, 
which personates every thing ; gives thunder a voice, 
hands to floods and trees ; and ascribes discourse, that 
" shakes the bones," and makes " the hair of the flesh 
«tand up," to a spirit in a standing posture, though " the 
form thereof could not be discerned," and in this man- 
ner describes a dream. The man who begins his creed 
with, " I believe in God," should pity but not persecute 
the '^ brother of low degree," who begins his with, " I 
^Ijelieve in the devil." God hath been supposed to gov* 



to SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 223 

ern the world by arbitrary decrees, so absolute as to 
render the miseries of life, and the punishment of hell 
utterly unavoidable by some of his creatures doomed 
before the beginning of the world to reprobation. Oth- 
ers have supposed he left the world to a loose sort of 
management called luck, chance, or fortune ; and so 
careless have some been on this article, that what the 
Bible reads, " We bless you in the name of the Lord,'' 
hath been rendered, and is daily read in public worship, 
" We wish you good luck in the name of the Lord." At 
this rate, not only the most serious and solemn events 
of life, but the whole worship of God is a game at haz- 
ard. Some have reported the present life to be, not a 
state of trial, regularly conducted by a necessary chain 
of causes and eflects, but by extraordinary interpositions 
of Providence ; so that every affliction is a judgment ; 
and to such a degree had this confusion of ideas risen 
among our ancestors, that they taught us to pray, " From 
the crafts of the devil, and all other deadly sin, from 
lightning, and from sudden death, good Lord deliver us ;" 
for sudden death was then reckoned a judgment, and a 
mark of reprobation. I call all these, confused reports 
of the nature and government of God. The Scriptures 
give us no account of the nature of a spirit ; and the gov- 
ernment of God, the first and wisest spirit must agree 
with the eminence of his perfections ; and there is not 
one of these reports, which doth so agree with him. 
Some affect his unity, others his independence, some 
his wisdom, others his goodness, others his power, and 
all are contrary to his express declaration, '' My thoughts 
are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, 
saith the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the 
earth, so are my ways higher than your ways, and my 
thoughts than your thoughts. To whom then will ye 
liken God ?" 

The same kind of confusion is gone forth in the ru- 
mours about Jesus Christ, and they affect the Scriptur- 
al report concerning his person, and the three principal 
offices, which he was so kind as to execute in our fa- 
vour. The Scripture gives us no more information con- 
cerning the nature of Christ, than it doth concerning the 



224 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

nature of other being-s mentioned by incident, nor was 
it necessary ; for truth of fact according to appearance, 
and not description of properties, which perhaps we 
could not comprehend, is the only important article to 
us in the present state. Three men inquiring the na- 
ture of Jesus Christ, agreed to be set down by the apos- 
tle John. The first took his Gospel and read, " The 
word that was made flesh was God ; that is, said he, by 
office." The second took the book and read, " The 
word that was made flesh was God ; that is, said he, 
by nature." The third took the book, read the same 
words, and said, '' I do not know what the nature of God 
is, so that I fear to say, Jesus Christ is God by nature : 
I do not know fully what the nature of God is not, and 
therefore I dare not say, Jesus Christ is so God by of- 
fice that he cannot be God by nature. In this difficulty 
I apply to the inspired apostle, and he saj^s nothing. I 
respect his silence, perhaps he knew no more : perhaps 
God who inspired him ordered him to add no more. 
Like him therefore I will call Jesus Christ what he 
calls him, pay him all the homage he paj's him, and be 
silent on a subject, which I do not fully understand." 

In regard to the offices of Christ, his prophetic office 
hath been most surprisingl}^ injured by false rumours 
about it. His work as a prophet was to teach religion, 
not husbandry, government, or any other kind of sci- 
ence. As he was a prophet completely qualified for 
his office, we have a right to expect a body of religion 
perfect in all its parts, founded on perfect principles, 
directed by perfect rules, and productive of the full and 
perfect ends, which it was given to answer. Such is 
our Prophet, and such is the religion he taught us : but; 
if this be a just notion, what have dreams, visions, im- 
pulses, and new revelations been but mere " noises that 
he was in the house !" By dreams it pleased God for- 
merly to instruct the Prophets, and what time so pro- 
per for men to receive impressions of new and religious 
subjects as that, which silence, absence of company, and 
all objects of sense contributed to render respectable 
and fit? By dreams, sometimes religion, as well as oth- 
-er businesses of life, impresses itself upon the hearty 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 225 

and fancy, sanctified by understanding and memory, 
takes occasion sometimes to refresh, and at other times 
to terrify and fatigue the mind. Thus a good m.an may 
have thoughts while he is asleep, which he may remem- 
ber after he is awake, and continue to recollect as long 
as he lives, and such recollections may influence his ac- 
tions. A vision is a seeing of something either real or 
imaginary; thus Peter, and James, and John saw Moses 
and Elias along with Jesus on the mountain, and Paul 
saw at Troas in the night, a " man of Macedonia," that 
is, he dreamt he saw such a man, and heard him say, 
" Come over into Macedonia and help us ;" the first 
was a true literal sight with the eyes ; the last was a 
perception of the mind. No doubt, people may have 
visions in the latter sense, and may dream they see, and 
converse with both the living and the dead. Impulses 
are impressions or influences on the mind, and we un- 
derstand, in general, by impulses, such impressions of 
sorrow, fear, pleasure, and so on, as we cannot account 
for. Now all these no further affect the prophetical of- 
fice of Christ, than as they are supposed to do the work 
of Scripture without the use of Scripture ; I mean, to re- 
veal the mind and will of God in regard to religion ; 
and in this view they are erroneous ; for we affirm, 
there hath not been one new idea of religion communi- 
cated immediately by God to mankind since the day in- 
spiration ceased, and the canon of Scripture was closed. 
We say more ; we believe there hath not been one 
thought in the world, except the first thoughts of inspir- 
ed men, which might not be accounted for, were we 
properly skilled in what is called association of ideas, 
the connexion, union, joining, linking (where shall I 
find a word plain enough ?) the connexion of one thought 
with another thought. This chain of thoughts is a law 
of nature ; it may be beclouded ; but it never can be 
destroyed. It is excellent advice given us by one of 
the prophets in the name of the Lord : " The prophet 
that hath a dream, let him tell a dream," let him tell it 
for a dream, and welcome, and no more ; and " he that 
hath my word, let him speak my word faithfully," let 
him speak my word as it is, without any additions and 



22b CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

mixtures of his own. " What is the chaff to the wheat ? 
saith the Lord. Behold I am against the prophets, that 
smooth their tongues and say, He saith." 

As the prophetical, so the priestly office of Christ 
hath been reported with much confusion. The priestly 
office of Christ hath generally been distinguished into the 
two parts of atonement and intercession. Not to trouble 
jou now with the Jewish meaning of the word atone- 
ment^ we have a remnant of old English in Scripture, 
which gives the meaning of it. Moses saw two He- 
brews strive together, and endeavoured to set them at 
one again. Had he succeeded, he would have produced 
a onement^ he would have made them at onement, in 
plain English, he would have made them friends again. 
This was effected between a justly offended God, and 
sinful man, by the death of Jesus Christ ; and thus "- God 
was in Christ," not reconciling himself to the world, 
but " reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing 
their trespasses unto them." This great event was pre- 
figured to the Jews by their sacrifices, the blood of 
which was shed at the altar, and sprinkled on the uten- 
sils ; but when people incorporate these gross ideas of 
washing in blood, and sprinkling Christians with blood, 
and apply them to the blood of Christ, they do indeed 
*' make a noise" about an event " in the house :" but 
they do not distinguish figures from facts, and to use the 
language of an apostle, "" except while they give sound, 
they give a distinction in the sounds, how shall it be 
known what is spoken ? He that speaketh shall be a 
barbarian unto me." 

Intercession is fervent and repeated pleading, inter- 
posed by a friend to two parties at difference : thus, when 
the prophet Jeremiah carried a prophecy to his king, 
and the king threatened to throw it into the fire, three 
of his courtiers " made intercession" to him, " that he 
would not burn the roll," nor punish the prophet and 
his scribe. Jesus Christ often, very often prayed to his 
heavenly Father for sinners, and the seventeenth chap- 
ter of John is an intercession in behalf of his apostles, 
and not of " them alone, but of them also which shall 
believe on him through their word." An apostle saitb^ 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 2^7 

^* He ever liveth to make intercession for theni ;" but 
as he adds, " He needeth not daily to offer up sacrifice," 
though he " hath an unchangeable priesthood," and is a 
" priest forever,"' so, I think, we may safely say. He 
needeth not daily to exercise this other branch of his 
office, and make perpetual intercession, though he ever 
liveth to convey the benefit of it to all that come unto 
God by him. The apostle means to distinguish the ben- 
efits of Christ's mediation, which are eternal, from those 
of the Jewish intercessions, which were momentary. 
God is not inflexible, he loves the disciples "as he 
loved" the Master, and him he " loved before the foun- 
dation of the world." If therefore it is reported that 
God is hard to be moved to pardon sinners ; that Jesu§ 
hath been pleading with him for many ages to do so ; 
that he is in waiting to receive and carry in our peti- 
tions ; that other intercessors are necessary to be joined 
with him ,• and that if we can ingratiate ourselves with 
Christ, he will recommend us to the notice of the Father ; 
we do " noise it about that he is in the house ;" but per- 
haps we may say, as was said in another case, " It is not 
the voice of them that shout for mastery, neither is it 
the voice of them that cry for being overcome :" we do 
not know what it is, " there is a noise of war in the 
camp." How different is the language of Jesus Christ ! 
Just before he died he said, '' It is finished ;" and after 
his resurrection, his constant language was, " Peace be 
with you." " I had rather speak in the church" these se- 
ven words " with my understanding, that by my voice I 
might teach others also, than ten thousand words in an 
unknown tongue." 

What abundance of confused things have been said 
concerning the kingly office of Christ. He was not a 
king literally ; but he was, and continues to be the chief 
governor, the sole governor of ail his followers. He 
gave us every thing necessary to the being and continu- 
ance of peace and good order; but since his ascension 
to heaven, we have had new masters, new laws, and 
new reasons for obeying them. The laws of Jesus 
Christ are of two kinds, called moral and positive ; the 
first is the law of nature, the obligations of men to God, 



228 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

to themselves, and to one another, which he both ex- 
emplified in his own conduct, and gave us a solemn 
charge to make the rules of our actions : the last are 
baptism and the Lord's supper, both which he positive- 
ly commanded his disciples to do, and teach to be done 
till his second coming. Instead of these Christian in- 
stitutes, we have had an endless number of laws of re- 
ligion, rules how to act through life, and at death ; and 
there is hardly a head of any party, who doth not pub- 
lish law, as if the law of nature, the life of Christ, and 
the New Testament were not a complete body of Chris- 
tian morality. Hence councils, creeds, synods, church- 
sessions, fathers, and rubricks from age to age, " noising" 
that law is " in the house." We have had new reasons 
for obeying these laws, motives different from the love 
of God, the fear of punishment, the pleasure of a good 
conscience, the misery of depravity, gratitude to Christ, 
the good of mankind, a joyful resurrection, a serene day 
of judgment, a blessed immortality ; and taken from the 
world and the maxims of it. 

We build error upon error, and say to a youth, You 
ought to profess yourself a Christian, because your pa- 
rents, when you was an infant, without your knowledge 
or consent, engaged that you should do so. Should the 
young man ask. By what authority did you dispose of 
me without my consent in a case which requires con- 
sent, and without which the transaction is null and void? 
What could we reply ? We might " noise it" abroad, 
" that reason was in the house," and Christ to be obey- 
ed ; and perhaps that might do. Jesus expressly says, 
" One is your master, even Christ ;" and to him alone 
all mankind are accountable for every exercise of reli- 
gion and conscience. Whoever or whatever presumes 
to exercise dominion over reason and conscience ; who- 
ever requires more to give right to all the benefits of 
Christianity than Scripture requires; whoever injures 
the civil rights of men under pretence of religion, does 
that, which Christ nejer did, and becomes an invader 
of a right granted by God, claimed by Christ, allowed 
by his disciples, and confirmed by the reason and fitness 
of things. Yes, law is iii the church, but it is the law 



I 



TO sued AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OP REllftlON. 22§ 

of Christ : motives are in the church, but they are the 
reasons of Christ : dominion is in the church, but it is 
the dominion of truth and virtue in the hand of a sove- 
reign, whose "dominioii is an everlasting dominion 
which shall not pass away, and his kingdom that which 
shall not be destroyed." Christians, shut your ears 
against groundless rumours, and say with a prophet ; 
" All people will walk every one in the name of his 
God, and we will walk in the name of the Lord our God 
forever and ever." He " will assemble her that halt- 
eth," and will " gather her that is driven out, and her 
that is afflicted, and reign over them from henceforth, 
even forever." 

The next article, I ought to mention, is that of the 
Holy Spirit^ whose nature in himself, and whose influ- 
ence in religion, have been both reported with a great 
confusion of ideas, true and false ; the false inconsistent, 
and the true disconcerted and out of order : but this is 
a subject of such great consequence, that it deserves a 
particular examination, and I shall endeavour to exam- 
ine it fully, when I shall have the pleasure of meeting 
you here next month. Mean time turn your attentioii 
to the subject ; I shall treat of it from the fourteenth 
verse of the eighth chapter of Romans ; " As many as 
are led by the spirit of God, they are the sons of God ;" 
and shall endeavour to convince you that the Holy Spir- 
it guides all good men. It was a custom in some primi- 
tive churches for the teacher to give notice at the end 
of one sermon what part of Scripture he intended to ex- 
pound at the next meeting ; mean time the people read 
and thought of the subject, and went prepared to under- 
stand it. An excellent method in some circumstances. 

How painful it is to hear an unmeaning noise about 
the Holy Spirit ! Have we a passage of Scripture in 
recollection? It is the Holy Spirit. Are we depressed 
through weakness of nerves ? The Spirit of God hath 
deserted us. Are we animated by the rapidity of our 
animal spirits ? It is the Holy Ghost living and acting 
in us. Do we pray ? It is that he would reveal to us 
our interest in Christ. Do we teach so that you are ed- 
ified ? We teach with the " Holv Ghost sent down from 
20 



230 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

heaven." Do the truths taught go pointed and sharp 
home to the conscience and conduct, and excite pain 
and displeasure ? It is not owing to the prudence or im- 
prudence of the teacher, or to '>he careless and disorder- 
ed frames of the hearers : but write " Ichabod" on the 
pulpit, " the glory is departed from Israel," and alas : this 
js the case every where ; " I hate" the teacher, " for he 
doth not prophesy good concerning me, but evil i" sure- 
ly " a lying spirit is gone forth in the mouth of all the 
prophets ! Feed these fellows with bread of affliction, 
and with water of affliction, until I," who, though I walk 
at large, ought always to be comforted, and filled with 
"joy unspeakable and full of glory," persecute them 
" until I come again in peace" . , . Before you go away, 
angry with truth and virtue for one of their most excel- 
lent properties, pressing pain into the service of reli- 
gion, receive and retain this ; false religion is a " king- 
dom full of darkness," where men " blaspheme the God 
of heaven, because of their pains and their sores, and 
repent not of their deeds." The Holy Spirit is in the 
church ; but he is there as he is in heaven, in perfect 
truth and purity, and all the rest is only a confused 
" noise that he is in the house." 

We are to observe next, that though false rumours 
about religion always do harm, yet sometimes they are 
accompanied with good. In our law the formal part, or 
method of proceeding, is unalterable, for justice would 
be perverted, if the course of law were arbitrary : how- 
ever, great indulgence is always shown to a well mean- 
ing justice, making any undesigned slip in his practice; 
yea, there are many statutes to protect him, which pro- 
vide, that he shall not be sued without notice before 
hand, and all suits begun shall be stopped on tender 
made of sufficient amends. The law distinguishes be- 
tween malice and infirmity. Let us imitate this equity 
in religion. That false doctrine doth harm cannot be 
doubted. It hath hurt the bodies, the understandings, 
the consciences, and the tempers of mankind. It hath 
injured the reputation, the property, the peace, the 
lives, and liberties of thousands. It hath cramped trade, 
suppressed genius, perverted government. What evil. 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 231 

hath it not done ? It poisons one half of the church, 
and persecutes the other to death. The subject would 
fill volumes, and I can only give you a hint of one small 
article, that is, the dangerous consequences of impulses ; 
especially when clothed in the language of Scripture, 
and reported by people of good character. 

About one hundred and ten years ago there lived at 
Graystock, in Cumberland (I know the spot), a farmer 
named Henry Winder. This man in the spring of the 
year had buried one of his children, to the inexpressible 
grief of himself and his wife. In harvest time two wo- 
men pretended to have a word from the Lord in 
prayer, went to Winder, and told him that the Lord had 
revealed to them as they were at prayer, that he and 
his wife had murdered their son, and that the Lord had 
sent them to say to him, " Yet forty days, yet forty 
days," are given thee to repent. The man and his wife 
were thunderstruck : but, knowing themselves perfectly 
innocent, they recovered th^ir spirits, and thought the 
women distracted, till they understood that the scandal 
was made public, and that many of the congregation, to 
which the women belonged, knowing them to be devout 
persons of good character, supposed them inspired to dis- 
cover sin, and to establish justice in the case. The 
matter at length became so serious as to interest the 
whole country, and the justices took it up. Winder de- 
nied, the women persevered, and delivered their testi- 
mony in prayers and tears, for they were very sincere, 
and the persecution of the farmer and his familj^ lasted 
three years, and ended in an action for defamation, tried 
at the assizes at Carlisle, and the imprisonment and ruin 
of the two' infatuated women and their families. ]So- 
thing could cure them ; they knew no one fact to crim- 
inate the man ; they had no feelings for the anguish of 
an innocent family taxed with murdering their own son ; 
but the Lord had spoken, and in the faith of this they 
went to jail, named twins, of which one of them was de- 
livered in prison, the one Innocent Prisoner, the other 
Harmless Sufferer, and protested '' O Lord, thou hast de- 
ceived us, and we were deceived: every one mocked 
»is since we cried violence and spoil ; but thy word is in 



232 Christians should behave properly 

our hearts as a burning fire shut up in our bones ; we 
are weary with forbearing, and cannot stay ; everiast- 
ing confusion shall prevail against our persecutors." 
This one instance is enough to nnake every one al'raid 
of impulses; for who can telHvhither they nnay carry 
him ? This is sufficient to make each of us pray, '' Re- 
move from me the way of lying, and graciously grant 
me thy law !" 

Several of you knew a good old man, who departed 
this life twenty years ago, and who often exhorted you 
to live by the Ten Commandments, and not by impul- 
ses. He used to tell, you know, how he got free from 
that delusion Miy years before. Then he was pious and 
poor, and thought (he was only a lad), that all sugges- 
tions in Scripture style came from heaven. Walking ia 
the field in want of firing by the side of a neighbour's 
hedge, he wished for some of it to burn, and the word 
came, '' In all this Job sinned not," and in the faith of 
this he began to make free with his neighbour's wood j 
but presently he discovered his error, tried his impulse 
by the eighth commandment, " Thou shalt not steal," 
and so got rid of an error, which might have led him 
out of the church into the jail. Let us profit by the 
mistakes of others, and let us examine whither what we 
take for religion directs its course 5 if to piety and vir- 
tue, it is the spirit of Christianity ; if to injustice and 
improper actions, it is nothing but turbulence and noise. 
The greater eagerness, with which we make such a 
Roise, the greater the crime of doing so. 

It would be endless to enumerate the mischiefs done 
by this confusion of tongues in religion. It turns prayer 
into *■' vain repetition," charity into the sound of a boast- 
er's trumpet, fasting into a '' disfigured face," teaching 
into " profane and vain babbling," Christian conversa- 
tion into frivolous jangling, and even extraordinary 
gifts of learning and eloquence into "sounding brass or 
a tinkling cymbal ;" it subverts all order and decency, 
it '' makes the hearts of the righteous sad, whom God 
hath not made sad, and strengthens the hands of the 
wicked by promising him life ;" it saith to the " man 
with a gold ring, Sit thou here in a good place ;" and it 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 233. 

teacheth him to say to the poor in plain raiment, " Stand 
thou here mider my footstool :" in one word, a noisy 
tongue not governed by pure religion " is a world of in- 
iquity," it " detileth the whole body, setteth on lire the 
course of nature," and consumeth all the ordinances of 
religion " in pleasurable sins." 

Yet, after all, it sometimes happens, that, though 
" the tongue is an unruly evil full of deadly poison, out 
of the same mouth proceedeth blessing and cursing." 
It " ought not" to be ; but it is so ; and justice requires 
iis to respect the blessing, while we abhor the curse. 
We have observed at the beginning, that the noise men- 
tioned in the text produced some good. A paralytie 
man was miraculously healed, his sins were forgiven, 
the word was preached, and the doctrine of forgiveness 
explained, numbers were pleased, and the " power of 
the Lord was present to heal" many. In like manner 
now, even confused reports produce good, and it is a 
great glory to the Gospel that it never changes its na- 
ture, but produces effects, which the most cruel and un- 
natural mixtures cannot prevent. 

Report produces attention, and this is one benefit. 
When the apostles first received the gift of tongues, it 
" was noised abroad," and brought the " multitude to- 
gether," and though some mocked, yet in the end 
" about three thousand souls gladly received the word." 
The men, who mocked the apostles then, had been scof- 
fers of religion before ; they were no worse for the ru- 
mour, and three thousand were much better. It will 
be said, this noise carried men to hear truth from the 
mouth of an inspired apostle himself. True : this is 
what I say, if noise about religion conduct men to read 
the writings of the inspired apostles, as it often does, 
then it does good. Indeed, if men stop in the crowd, 
and take the report at second, or at fiftieth hand, the 
good is defeated : somebody hath made a proselyte, and 
that is all. In some countries the crowd that got near- 
est the apostles set an army to keep oif those at a dis- 
tance, and a man, who at this late hour of the world 
hears a noise about " one Jesus who was dead, whom 
Paul affirmed to be alive," must take his ideas from 
20* 



234 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

people appointed by the soldiers to give them ; he must 
not read, or what is the same, he must not judge for 
himself. It is not so with you : you may read, and 
think, and act, and do any thing but disturb society. In 
this view I call even a confused account of Christ a 
comparative benefit, because any thing is better than 
being " dead in trespasses and sins," and every thing 
that sets men a thinking on religion does good, at least 
may do good. 

Confused rumours sometimes stir men up to action, 
and invitations to do wrong sometimes rouse men to do 
right. When David was in the decline of life, the in- 
firmities of age took up so much of his thought, that he 
neglected or forgot to settle the affairs of his own fami- 
ly and the kingdom. He had a favourite son to whom 
he had never said, '' Why hast thou done so ?" who 
-availed himself of the opportunitj^, and prepared to 
make himself king. A confused rumour of this excited 
Bathsheba, Nathan, and David to crown Solomon, and 
to crush a conspiracy that would have drenched a whole 
kingdom in blood. Thus in the present case, if zeal for 
error and superstition, excites emulation for truth and 
virtue, the noise made ¥n favour of the former may 
strengthen and confirm the latter. I allow it is a low 
motive to duty ; but any is better than none, and Scrip- 
ture gives us many arguments of this kind. There was 
a people among the ancient Jews called Rechabites from 
Rechab, one of their ancestors. These people, in com- 
pliance with the advice of one of their Fathers, abstain- 
ed from wine, and dwelt in tents without any fixed pro- 
perty. The prophet Jeremiah, to engage his country- 
men to serve God their Father, invited some of the 
heads of these people into a chamber of the temple, 
and set before them " pots and cups full of wine," and 
intreated them to drink. No, said they, " we will 
drink no wine," for " our Father commanded us and our 
sons to drink no wine forever, and we have done all that 
our Father commanded us." With this lesson, by the 
com,mand of God, the prophet goes to the inhabitants of 
Jerusalem, and says, '' Will ye not receive instruction ?" 
The Rechabites "perform the words of their Father un- 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 235 

to this day ; but I the Lord, have spoken unto you ear- 
ly," and '' I have also sent unto you prophets ; but you 
have not hearkened unto me." There are many argu- 
ments in Scripture of this kind. 

Among all the clouds and darkness of error, which in- 
volve us poor mortals, there may be a ray of saving 
truth ; at least God often makes, I perceive, merciful 
distinctions, where man would least think of them. The 
Jewish hermits just now mentioned, were blessed by 
him, though they exposed themselves to more sever- 
ity than the laws of temperance required. Abimelech 
was forgiven for violating the laws of hospitality, and 
God allowed half his excuse, that " in the integrity of 
his heart," though not in the " innocency of his hands," 
he had done it ; he approved the first and forgave the 
last. God girded Cyrus, though Cyrus "knew hini 
not." He pitied the Ninevites, and " turned away from 
his fierce anger," though it was not repentance but su=- 
perstition that starved the innocent cattle, and " covers 
ed beasts with sackcloth," the people exciting^sorrow in 
themselves by the lowing of oxen, and braying of asses 
for want of meat. Naaman was pardoned, though his 
office at court obliged him to "bow in the house of Rim» 
mon ;" for God distinguished between waiting on a mas- 
ter and worshipping an idol, and knew, " he offered nei^ 
ther burnt-offering nor sacrifice unto any other God but 
unto the Lord." When God showed Nebuchadnezzar 
himself, his family, and his kingdom, under the similitude 
of a "high, strong, spreading, fruitful tree," and gave 
command, " Hew down the tree, cut off" his branches, 
shake off his leaves, scatter his fruit, and let the beasts 
and the fowls get away," he added, "Nevertheless, 
leave the stump of his roots in the earth," and secure it 
" with a band of iron and brass, till seven years pass 
over him," to show that haughty monarch, that his 
kingdom should be "sure unto him, after he should 
come to know that the heavens do rule," and that 
^' those who walk in pride, God is able to abase." God 
only is equal to distinctions of all kinds and in all cases ; 
but while charity inclines us to hope the best, we should 
use all possible means to ^void the worst. 



236 f:HRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY 

We conclude, then, that in a state of things, which 
we cannot alter, we shouiu take pains to act properly. 
What can frail man do ? Every thing- hath heen tried, 
but nothing hath succeeded except a wise and moderate 
course of action. Riches have been tried ; but they 
corrupt religion ; or, to speak more properly, bribe 
mercenary men to corrupt it. Honours have been tri- 
ed ; but they only give bad men credit to do mischief, 
and turn the church into a worldly sanctuary, where ca- 
bal and intrigue take place of religion and the fear of 
God. Amusements have been employed ; but they turn 
the church into a play-house, and banish truth, gravity, 
and sobriety of manners, to make room for levity and 
pastimes. Power hath been used, and cruelties have 
been exercised ; but reason, to say nothing of religion, 
hath blushed at the sight. When our King Harry the 
Eighth attempted to make himself head of the church of 
England, which he could not do without the consent of 
the house of convocation, a sort of Parliament of cler- 
gy, he sent some noblem.en to state the business, and to 
take their ans . 3r. The bishop of Rochester objected 
to make the king head of the church, and asked, What 
if the king should alter religion, where is our remedy ? 
What if he should oppress us, must we sue. to the king 
against himself? What if a woman or an infant should 
succeed to the crown, can they be heads of the church ? 
This would be to make the church no church, the Scrip- 
ture no Scripture, and at last Jesus no Christ. The 
clergy felt this, and sent the king word, that they would 
agree to his being head of the church " as far as was 
agreeable to the word of God." When the noblemen 
returned with this answer to his Majesty, and told him, 
the clergy would agree to his demand as far as was con- 
sistent with Scripture, the king fell into a violent pas- 
sion, and said with an oath to the noblemen, " Go back 
again, and let me have the business done without any as 
fars and so far s. I will have no as fars nor no so fars in 
the business ; but let it be done." Doth not reason 
blush at such an unbounded power over religion and 
conscience in the hands of such a man ? Let the perse- 
cuted answer. Such a remedy for enthusiasm is worse 
than the disease itself. 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OF RELIGION. 



257 



The proper method is a wise moderation. I will ex- 
plain myself. By a wise moderation I mean a calmness 
of mind, that doth not proceed from ignorance or indif- 
ference, but from a cool and judicious consideration of 
the whole of the matter. It would be a sad misfortune 
to a man in trade not to know a guinea from a shilling, 
or a light guinea from one that was full weight ; but it 
would be a much v/orse not to know truth from error, 
virtue from vice, religion from superstition, the voice 
of the shepherd from the noise of strangers. It would 
be a melancholy thing to be cold and indifferent to truth 
and error; to-behold food and poison, my Father and 
my murderer, the God of truth and the father of lies, 
with equal feelings. Remember the saying of the apos- 
tle John, " No lie is of the truth." On the other hand, 
it would be very unpleasant to lose evenness of temper, 
for we never do so without pain, and seldom without 
guilt. A conduct made up of a wise discernment of 
truth from error, with a firm profession of the one and 
a hearty hatred of the other, together with a calm and 
gentle temper, is what we think deserves to be called a 
course of wise moderation. The advice of our Lord, 
when he sent forth his disciples as sheep in the midst 
of wolves, was, " Be ye wise as serpents and harmless 
jis doves." The wisdom of the serpent alone is a dan^ 
gerous subtlety, and the innocence of the dove alone i$ 
a pliableness to folly ; but the union of the two in equal 
proportions makes a perfect Christian. 

Our conduct should be prudent as well as wise and 
moderate. By prudence, I mean wisdom applied to 
practice. It is not enough that we can distinguish truth 
from error, we must endeavour to diminish error and 
vice, and to promote truth and virtue. Ills, which can- 
not be entirel}^ removed, may however be abated by a 
prudent application of proper means, and circumstance^ 
must determine what means are proper. A ruler of the 
Jews besought Jesus to restore his daughter to life ; 
when Jesus came into the house, and " saw the min^ 
strels and the people making a noise," he only said, 
" Give place, why make ye this ado, and weep ? The 
damsel is not dead but sleepeth ;" but when they " laugh- 



238 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLV ' 

ed him to scorn, he put them all out, except Peter, and 
James, and John, and the lather and the mother of the 
maiden." The crowd were not in a temper to profit by 
the sight of a miracle, which they had the arrogance to 
condemn without examination. Prudence requires us to 
give an example of affection for truth in distinction 
from error. It requires us to encourage and embolden 
all the friends of truth in opposition to error. It re- 
quires us to use all proper means to inform the igno- 
rant. It i(-equires us not to conceal our hearty appro- 
bation of the one, and utter dislike of the other. It re- 
quires us to conciliate the esteem of the wandering in 
order to allure them into the right way. In a word, 
prudence requires us, while we " bear all things, hope 
all things," and " endure all things," " to do nothing 
against the truth but for the truth," 

Lastly, our conduct should be patient^ and we should 
bear with the evil for the sake of the good. Let me 
expound this case by another. Our Lord commands us 
to '' love our enemies." Most men complain of the dif- 
ficulty of this duty, and think it harder than all the Ten 
Commandments : but would not a little attention to the 
meaning make this hard thing easy ? When a neigh- 
bour becomes an enemy, we forget every thing of him 
except his enmity : that day, that one fatal day, that ac- 
tion, that unjust, that unkind action, that word, that cru- 
el word, occupies the whole of our attention : that we 
hate, and it deserves hatred, and the Lord doth not re- 
quire us to love enmity, injustice, and ingratitude, those 
black and dismal crimes. Now could we find temper 
to consider the whole of the man, we should find some- 
thing lovely in him ; and that lovely action we ought to 
esteem, even in the person of an enemy. What! Is 
virtue nothing, because the man who doth it does not 
happen to be my friend? Perhaps I love virtue only 
for the sake of the benefits 1 derive from it, and per- 
haps I should find in my heart to dislike an angel, who 
should pass my door and visit my neighbour who is an 
enemy to me. The man is not ail enmity, he loves his 
wife and family, and many people ; he loves his coun- 
try, and perhaps his God too, though he doth not bap- 



' TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOUNTS OP RELIGION. "239 

pen to like me : but who am I, that I should make love 
of me a test of excellence ? Am I perfect, and always 
in every moment an object of esteem ? People will not 
enter into these just and mild sentiments, and therefore 
they see nothing- to love in their enemies ; but, if they 
once dislike, go on, like the Philistines and Edomites 
towards Israel, till hatred is transmitted from father to 
son, and becomes, as a prophet expresseth it, an " old 
and perpetual hatred." Apply this to the case in hand. 
If it be possible to find a little truth in a great mass of 
error ; that little truth deserves esteem, and we should 
consider it as the Lord considered Lot, whom " he sent 
out of the midst of the overthrow, when he overthrew 
the cities in which he dwelt." 

Having said so much against turning the church into 
a Babel by confounding the pure language of God in 
Scripture with the jargon of the w^orld, it should seem 
but fair to say one word before we part, in favour of 
those, whose " axes and tools are heard in the house :" 
for false rumours about Christ are not only abroad in 
the world, but are actually in the church, and many a 
cleansed " leper is making a noise," about what he doth 
but half understand. 

You are " Apollos, an eloquent man," and " mighty in 
the Scriptures." You are " instructed in the way of 
the Lord, and being fervent in spirit," you " speak and 
teach diligently the things of the Lord." ' I respect you, 
and admire in you your talent for speaking in public, 
your great love of the Scriptures, and the zeal that ani- 
mates j^our conduct : but you " know only the baptism 
of John." Do not disgrace your fine abilities with 
pride. Submit to be informed of " the way of God more 
perfectly." There are tent-makers who have had the 
honour of a long acquaintance with the writings of Paul, 
and, having profited by his instructions, they can teach 
you in private to understand what you may hereafter 
teach publicly better than they. 

The world blanie you for making a noise about reli- 
gion, and your brethren blame you for pretending to 
teach what you do but imperfectly understand. Tell 
the world, you have at all adventures the advantage of 



240 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY" 

them : there is something in religion substantial, and 
the little you know is worth contending for ; but they, 
who make far more noise than you, make it about no- 
thing. Observe the prophet Jeremiah, how he de- 
scribes the glory of Egypt. " Who is this that cometh 
up as a flood ?" It is » Egypt, who saith, I will go up 
and will cover the earth. Come up, ye horses, and 
rage, ye chariots, and let the mighty men come forth, 
the Ethiopians that handle the shield, and the Lydians 
that bend the bow." What saith the prophet to all 
this ? O mortifying truth ! the king of Babylon shall 
" sweep aAvay" all this fine army, and Pharaoh's own 
soldiers shall say, " Pharaoh, king of Egypt, is but a 
noise." What but a noise about nothing, is honour, 
splendour, grandeur, majesty, when, under all these 
great sounds you find nothing but a discontented, dyin^ 

man! 

Do the world reproach you with making a noise about 
religion ? Tell the world, that though you do not un- 
derstand the whole of Christianity, yet you know enough 
of it to convince you, that many contentions of bad men, 
which make a great sound in the world, are for the 
obtaining of some wicked end ; and that you have no 
such ends to obtain. The prophets, who gave us many 
pictures of real life, will furnish you with many. Who 
are they, who " drink, and make a noise through wine ?" 
A company of sots gone raving mad in their cups. Who 
are they, that make the " noise of a cry from the fish- 
gate, a howling" from the dock, " and a great crashing 
from the hills ?" They are *' merchant people," who 
bear " silver, leap on the threshold, fill their masters' 
houses with violence and deceit, saying in their heart, 
The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil." 
Who are they, that make a city ring with '^ the noise of 
a whip, and the noise of the rattling of wheels, of pranc- 
ing horses, and jumping chariots justling one against 
another, with flaming torches running like lightnings in 
the streets ?" They are " mighty men in scarlet, full 
of lies and robbery, lions tearing in pieces enough for 
'their whelps, strangling for their lionesses, filling their 
holes with prey, and their dens with rapine." Who are 



I 



TO SUCH AS GIVE CONFUSED ACCOU.NTS OF RELIGION. 241 

they, that " lay waste cities, and make a full land deso- 
late by the noise of their roaring ?" They are the 
slaves of a tyrant, "taxing land," and ^' exacting the sil- 
ver and the gold of the people of the land, of every- 
one according to his taxation, to give it unto Pharaoh.'"' 
Who are they, whose every battle " is with confused 
noise, and garments rolled in blood :" who are the3^, 
that " make a noise like a dog, and go" snarling '^ round 
about the city ?" They are men '' wandering up and 
down for meat, and grudging if they be not satisiied." 
Is it for such men, who disturb society, and se*t the world 
in a ilame for the sake of obtaining a little money to 
spend upon their unruly passions, is it for them to re- 
proach you ? " Lift up your voice like a trumpet. 
Smite your hands together. Stamp with your foot. 
Shake off the dust of your feet : verily I say unto you, 
it shall be more tolerable in the day of judgment for 
the land of Sodom and Gomorrah," than for such as re- 
ject even your faithful warnings, though they were all 
taken from the doctrine and spirit of John the baptist. 
Imitate your master; say to the " publicans. Exact no 
more than that v,^hich is appointed you." Bid the " sol- 
diers do violence to no man, neither accuse any false- 
ly, and be content with their wages." Tell the com- 
mon '' people who have two coats, to impart to them 
that have none." Tell them all, " The axe is laid un- 
to the root of the trees, and every tree which briiigeth 
not forth good fruit shall be hewn down, and cast into 
the lire." Do more than all this : send your disciples 
to Christ, to say unto him, " Art thou he that should 
come, or do we look for another ?" Teach them to 
think and judge for themselves, and so do honour to 
your own understanding, and justice to the rights of 
mankind. 

Let us all lament the wounds given to our Saviour 
'• in the house of liis friends." His is a great charac- 
ter : it should never be treated of with malice, levity, 
or carelessness. Let each of us undo, if it be possible- 
whatever we have done to defame his bright reputa- 
tion. Let us live up to the light we have, and humb:y 
look forward to that day, when even true prophecies, - 
21 



242 CHRISTIANS SHOULD BEHAVE PROPERLY, &,C. 

and apostolical " tongues shall fail, and love, universal 
love, shall abide the duty, the felicity, and the glory of 
every upright soul ; where the " feeble shall be as Da- 
vid, and David as an angel of God." May God crown 
our homely endeavours with success. 



DISCOURSE XIII. 

THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 
l£T FULBOURJYE.il 

ROMANS viii. 14. 

As many as are led by the Spirit of God^ they are the 
Sons of God. 

Christians, 

You knew my text and my subject a month ago, 
and I dare say you have been reading, and reasoning, 
and conversing about it. For my part, I have observed 
a powerful motive in the text to engage us all to do so : 
they are '' the sons of God," who are led by his Spirit. 
This is the highest of all titles, and opens a prospect to 
the highest of all happiness. Hear our apostle : " If 
children, then heirs ; heirs of God and joint heirs with 
Christ ;" first to " suffer," then to be " glorified with him, 
with a glory to be revealed in us," with which '' the 
sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be com- 
pared." lie elsewhere calls it '' a far more exceeding 
imd eternal weight of glory :" and this for men, in whose 
" flesh there dwelleth no good thing." If such noble 
objects be sufficient to fire and inflame our hopes, cer- 
tainly the path that leads to the enjoyment of them is 
sufficient to inspire us with caution and fear. 

No man, it seems, walks in this path to glory but he 
who is 'Med by the spirit of God;" he only is a son o[ 



244 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEK. 

God. What if I should miss the path ! What if, when 
at the end of mj days I think myself at the door of hea- 
ven, I should find myself at the gate of hell! O cold 
and cruel thought! Why should I indulge it? There 
can be only two just reasons for dread ; and if these be 
not well grounded, there are no more. One is in the 
subject itself. If the leading of the Spirit be impossible 
to be known; if there be no certain rule to distinguish 
the work of the Spirit from every other work ; then in- 
deed I am liable to a fatal mistake, and become an ob- 
ject of the greatest pity, the greater for being invited 
by a respectable book to search after what the wisest in 
the world can never find. The other is, although the 
subject may be understood, yet if I have no heart to 
search, it v/ould be madness to expect to understand. 
Peace be with all your consciences ! The first I am 
sure, is a groundless fear ; for God is so different from 
every other being, and the religion he hath taught us 
so distinct from every other exercise in the world, 
that there is no more danger of a man's not finding this 
part of the Christian religion, if he looks for it, than 
there is of his not finding the sun. If you be sincerely 
seeking to be directed by the Holy Scriptures, I can in- 
form you for 3'our comfort, that you will succeed ; for 
we know who said, '• Seek and ye shall find ; every one 
that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth. 
Do you think, the Scripture speaketh in vain ?" 

The first thing that struck me in thinking of being 
'' led by the Spirit," was. What am I thinking about ? 
Who or what is the Spirit of God ? I turned the sub- 
ject on ever}^ side, began below to try to climb upward, 
and said, '• Who knoweth the spirit of a beast that go- 
eth downward ?" Not I. " Who knoweth the spirit of 
a man that goeth upward ?" Not I. Who hath '' heard 
the voice, or seen the shape" of God? "No man at 
any time :" for the " bodily shape like a dove," called 
•' the Holy Ghost," and said to " descend upon Jesus," 
and "light upon him," was neither the Holy Ghost in 
person, nor a real dove, nor a form like either the Ho- 
ly Ghost or a dove ; but it was a bright light hovering 
over Jesus, and at length settling upon his head, just as 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 245 

a dove hovers and lights upon the ground. How then 
can any one know the Holy Spirit of God ? There is 
only one way, and that Jesus Christ teacheth in these 
words, " No man hath seen God at any time ; the only 
begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he 
hath declared him." It is to Jesus Christ then, and not 
to scholars and philosophers, nor to our own conjectures, 
that we are to go for information on this subject. Our 
Lord very often spoke of it, and what he hath declared 
is all we know, or can know of the matter. Now, as 
we have often observed to you, should we make a list 
of all the subjects, which Jesus Christ taught, and of 
those which he mentioned only incidentally and by the 
way, and ask. What hath the '' only begotten of the Fa- 
ther declared" on these subjects, the proper answer 
would be. He hath declared their uses but not their na- 
tures, their influences upon us, but not the materials of 
which they are made, and the manner in which they 
subsist. 

To give you an infallible example of this manner of 
expounding Scripture, I quote to you a passage in the 
first Epistle of John. The apostle repeats the same 
expression, " No man hath seen God at any time," once 
in his Gospel without an exposition, and only saying Je- 
sus declared him, and once in his Epistle with an expo- 
sition how he declared him. " No man hath seen God 
at any time :" but if " we love one another, God dweli- 
eth in us. We dwell in him, and he in us, because he 
hath given us of his Spirit . . . God is love, and he that 
dwelieth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him." In 
this manner the Scriptures expound themselves, and on 
this account I said just now it was as easy to iind the 
truth as to discover the sun : but, alas ! people are not 
looking for what Jesus declared, but for something of 
somebody's else declaring, for which indeed they have 
a name, but of- which they have no idea. Should I s.^t 
one of you, not skilled in astronomy, any day to look for 
the sun, you would soon find it ; but should I say, bro- 
ther, be so kind as look upward, east, vvest^ north, und 
south, and find Andromeda, you might very well never 
find, when you did not know^ what you was l9oking for. 
21* 



246 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MESf. 

I wish, with all my soul, I could be so happy as to 
convey this idea so that it could not possibly be misun- 
derstood ; and admit the goodness of my intention as an 
excuse for a homely way of speaking-. Suppose I were 
to take two samples of corn to market for two farmers 
at a distance, whom no man had seen or could see. 
Suppose yourselves to buy two loads of corn by these 
two samples. Suppose, when they were delivered, one 
should be as good as the sample, and fair Winchester 
measure, and the other worse than the sample, and short 
measure. Would not you instantly know these two un- 
known men ? Yes, say you, we should know, and we 
should not know ; we should not know whether they 
were tall or low, fat or lean, fair or brown, old or 
young ; but we should know that one was wise and ho- 
nest, and the other weak or wicked ; and by looking in- 
to the Holy Scriptures we should know what the unseen 
and unknown God thought of them, for he saith, " Ye 
shall do no unrighteousness in measure. Just weights 
and a just bushel shall ye have," for " divers weights, 
and divers measures, both of them are alike abomina- 
tion to the Lord. A just weight is his delight. Shall I 
count him pure with the bag of deceitful weights, and 
the scant measure that is abominable V These are 
not the practices of good men, whom " the Lord requi- 
reth to do justly ;" these are " treasures of wickedness 
in the house of the wicked." Pday God pardon us for 
speaking of him below his dignity ! What can we, poor 
mortals, crawling out of darkness into daylight, do ! 
though we lirst '' see men like trees walking," yet after 
the great master " puts his hands again upon our eyes," 
we shall " look up,, and see every man clearly." 

It is then from the Holy Scriptures that we are to de- 
rive our notions of the Holy Spirit ; and our first work 
shall be to examine the history of the Holy Spirit as 
these oracles of God report it . . . Having done this we 
will examine how the Holy Spirit leads or guides all 
good men . . . and these two articles will fully explain 
the text, '"' As many as are led by the Spirit of God, they 
are the sons of God," remembering all along, that we are 
not in search of an imaginary being set up before-hand 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 247 

in our own fancies, but we are inquiring what conclu- 
sion we ought to come to under the direction of those 
infallible guides, inspired men. I think also, I need not 
inform you, that we are not to determine any thing con- 
cerning the nature of the Holy Ghost by the similitudes 
used in Scripture to describe his influence in the world. 
The Spirit of God is not tire, he is not breath or air, he 
doth not come or go, or proceed from one to another, he 
is not capable of being grieved ; the Spirit of God is 
God, and none of these things agree with the eminence 
of his perfections. He " moved upon the face of the 
waters . . . He garnished the heavens, and his hand 
formed the crooked serpent ... He filled Bezaleel and 
Aholiab with wisdom to teach the engraver, the em- 
broiderer, and the weaver, how to work all manner of 
work for the service of the sanctuary . . . He is in man, 
giving him life and understanding . . . He is one Spirit, 
the Father of all, i^ho is above all, and through all, and 
in you all ;" all the universe is a bodj^, of which he is 
the soul, and " in him we live, and move, and have our 
being." It is not the Spirit of God in any of these sen- 
ses that we are searching for. It is not God in the 
mere exercise of his power as the Creator and Govern- 
or of the world ; but it is God in the exercise of his ho- 
liness as the author and maintainer of religion, after 
which we are inquiring ; and it is to fix our attention on 
this, that the New Testament calls God, exercising his 
holiness in the church, near a hundred times the " Holy 
Ghost," or the '' Holy Spirit;" for the old English word 
ghost signifies Spirit. Indeed our forefathers were such 
children in understanding, as to think that the souls ot 
departed men might return to this world, and walk 
about, and be seen, especially in the dark, and such a 
walking Spirit they called a ghost ; and hence came the 
word ghastly^ that is dismal, horrible, melancholy in 
the countenance ; but nothing of ail this belongs to God, 
whom, as we have before observed, " no man hath 
seen at any time," and of whom we know nothing ex- 
cept what is declared in Scripture, and the Scriptures 
declare nothing of God in religion, except that ail his 
influences are to be known by their holiness. 



248 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

The first appearance of God in religion, the ground 
of all the rest, was in revealing, or making known fu- 
ture events, "signifying before hand the sufferings of 
Christ, and the glory that should follow." In this, the 
first view, God proposeth himself to our consideration 
as a " spirit of prophecy," the first of which is, " The 
seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head, and 
the serpent shall bruise his heel." This information 
was given by God himself to our first parents. In after 
times, during lour tnousand years, it pleased God to 
communicate more of this subject to many men, some- 
times in dreams, sometimes by visions, and at other 
times by suggesting new and extraordinary thoughts, 
and along with them an irresistible impulse to impart 
their knowledge to others. About two thousand years 
after the first prophecy, it pleased God to give his 
church by Moses a clear law to determine all cases of 
prophecy ; for as prophesying gai^ned credit in the 
world, a temptation rose to induce bad men to feign 
themselves prophets. Foolish and wicked men, who 
could do nothing else to procure the benefits of this 
life, could easily make a lie, and if that lie could gain 
credit, it answered all the end of ability and industry. 
The law of Moses is quite clear on this subject. It de- 
scribes the case and determines the punishment. If the 
prophecy " came to pass," and if the prophet led men 
to holiness, then he was thought to be sent of God ; but 
if either the prophecy did not come pass, or if it did, 
and the prophet added, " Let us serve other gods," then, 
saith the law, " That prophet shall die." The Jewish 
prophets not only foretold an event that was to come to 
pass long after their death, as the birth of Christ ; but 
they foretold other events, which came to pass in their 
own times. When they spoke of very distant events, 
they were to be judged of by their moral character ; and 
when they spoke of very near events, the accomplish- 
ment was to determine. Two passages of Scripture 
confirm this. Jeremiah says to a false prophet, " Hear 
thou this word, which I speak in thine ears, and in the 
ears of all the people. The prophets that have been 
before me, and before thee of old, prophesied both 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEW. 249 

against many countries, and against great kingdoms, of 
war, and of evil, and of pestilence. When the word of 
the prophet shall come to pass, then shall the prophet 
be known, that the Lord hath truly sent him". True, 
saith Moses, " if the thing follow not, the Lord hath not 
spoken, but the prophet hath spoken it presumptuously, 
thou shalt not be afraid of him ; but if there arise a 
prophet, and the sign do come to pass," yet if he say, 
••' Let us serve other gods, you shall surely kill him ; 
thou shalt not consent unto him, nor hearken unto him, 
neither shall thine eye pity him, neither shalt thou 
spare, neither shalt thou conceal him, but thou shalt stone 
him with stones that he die, because he hath sought to 
thrust thee away from thy God." This law was not al- 
ways executed ; but from the time of Moses to that of 
Christ, it was death by the law to utter a false prophe- 
cy, which no good man durst presume to do ; and pro- 
vision was made that the ingenious conjectures of bad 
men should not pass for prophecies to lead people off 
from their holy religion, which stood pure in the first 
and chief doctrine of one living and true God, the ob- 
ject of all religious adoration and praise. 

Various as the prophecies of these holy men were, 
there was one event, which they all agreed to foretell ; 
that was the appearance of a prophet greater than them- 
selves, and having the Spirit of God in a variety and 
fulness unknown to them, Moses saith in the name of 
God, " 1 will raise them up a prophet from among their 
brethren like unto thee." David said, '' The Lord said 
unto my Lord, Sit thou at my right hand, rule thou in 
the midst of thine enemies, judge among the heathen, 
drink of the brook in the way, lift up the head, thou 
art a priest forever. God hath anointed thee with the 
oil of gladness above thy fellows." Isaiah saith, " Be- 
held mine elect in whom my soul delighteth, I have put 
my spirit upon him to proclaim liberty to captives, to 
preach good tidings unto the meek. I will pour my 
spirit, as water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon 
the dry ground, and an offspring shall spring up as wil- 
lows by the water courses." Joel and others say, " I 
will pour out my spirit upon all flesh ... I give thee 



250 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my sal- 
vation to the ends of the earth ... In thee shall all 
the families of the earth be blessed." All these proph- 
ecies were fulfilled in Jesus Christ, of whom the last 
prophet of the Jews said. He is the Christ, " he com- 
eth from above, and is above all ; the Father hath given 
all things into his hand, for God giveth not the spirit by 
measure unto him." 

The old prophets then had a spirit of prophecy, and 
a spirit of holiness ; that is, they had the Spirit of God ; 
they knew a little of those future events, which God 
perfectly understood, and which little he imparted to 
them ; and they possessed a little degree of such justice 
and goodness as God possesses in infinite perfection. Je- 
sus Christ is a new character, having the Spirit of God 
without measure, possessing wisdom, justice, goodness, 
and every excellence in unlimited variety, and in abso- 
lute perfection. What did Jesus Christ with this fulness 
of the Spirit of God ? He communicated it to his disci- 
ples, " and so sent them even as his Father sent him," 
saying " Receive ye the Holy Ghost." Christ did not 
communicate to them, for they were not capable of re- 
ceiving it, all the Spirit of God that dwelt in him ; but 
he communicated it in part, therefore they " knew in 
part, and prophesied in part." When they were chil- 
dren they thought and spoke as children ; but when they 
became men they " put away childish things." The 
question is. What did Jesus communicate to his apostles 
for the Holy Ghost ? This question is properly answer- 
ed by distinguishing extraordinary powers, peculiar to 
themselves, and necessary to obtain a hearing of their 
doctrine in the world, from ordinary communications 
common to them and to all other good men to the end 
of the world. When Christ came into the world, and 
condescended to ask a distracted race of men to give 
him a hearing, what glorious reasons did he stoop to be- 
stow ! He healed the sick, he raised the dead, he fed 
the multitude, he empowered his apostles to speak with 
divers tongues, and to perform many miracles, all for 
the good of society, all to " convince the world of sin, 
of righteousness, and of judgment," During the life of 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 251 

Christ he communicated to his apostles his own ideas of 
things, what notion he had of God, what of Scripture, 
what of a future state, and his wisdom made them wise. 
He imparted to them his own just and gentle tempers ; 
through his goodness they became good. He communi- 
cated to them proper actions, and by seeing how he 
conducted himself, they learnt how to behave them- 
selves. These communications, ordinary and extraordi- 
nary, are what one of them calls, a " receiving out of 
his fulness grace for grace." 

Before Jesus Christ left the world, he promised the 
apostles to supply his absence, after he should have left 
them, by " another Comforter, even the Spirit of truth," 
v/hich, saith he, " ye know, for he dwelleth with you, 
and shall be in you ;" that is, the truths you know now 
shall be increased and multiplied, and you shall know 
them better, and more to your comfort after my death 
than you have done before. After his resurrection, as 
he had promised, he " saw them again," and while he 
was eating with them, he commanded them that they 
should not go out of town, but wait at " Jerusalem for 
the promise of the Father, which, said he, ye have 
heard of me, for ye shall be baptized with the Holy 
Ghost not many days hence." Accordingl}^ about forty 
days after his death, and a few days after his ascension, 
they received the Holy Ghost in a rich abundance both 
of ordinary and extraordinary powers, the first in a 
very high degree of excellence, and the last in a man- 
ner peculiar to themselves. The apostles had these 
powers in trust to communicate to others, and they exe- 
cuted the trust faithfully by imparting their extraordi- 
nary knowledge how to heal the sick, and how to speak 
with tongues to some others, and this knowledge ceased 
when these extraordinary men died ; but such ideas as 
were necessary for the salvation of ordinary Christians 
to the end of the world they left in writing, and so be- 
queathed, as it were, to posterity that Holy Spirit, which 
they had received of their Divine Master for the use of 
all mankind. 

Thus the history of the Holy Ghost stands in Scripture 
divided into three periods ; the first, from Adam to Christ, 



252 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

was a Holy Spirit of prophecy; the second, in the life 
of Christ, was a Holy Spirit of prophecy, information, 
and promise, accompanied with wisdom to know how to 
work miracles, and power to give it effect ; the third, 
from Pentecost to the moment in which the apostle 
John wrote the last line of his Gospel, was a holy dis- 
pensation of wisdom, goodness, and power, partly prop- 
er to that age and ceasing with it, and partly containing 
intelligence to inform and direct religion to the end of 
time. We have had a fourth part of the history of the 
Holy Ghost published to the world ; but it is a spurious 
one. Who can believe that the Holy Ghost dwells in- 
fallibly in a fallible man at Rome, or that he is of a 
particular order of monks, or that he is the author of 
laws and tempers directly destructive of the laws and 
tempers of Christ ? Who can imagine that the same Holy 
Ghost bids one man say, " Search the Scriptures," and 
another man say, " Search not the Scriptures;" com- 
mands one to say, " Love thy neighbour as thyself," and 
another to say, Injure thy neighbour when it suits thy 
convenience ; orders one to say, " The Holy Scriptures 
are able to make thee wise unto savation," and to anoth- 
er to say. Scripture is not able to make thee wise unto 
salvation. This would be to sink the dignity of reli- 
gion, to make a God in contradiction with himself, and 
to put all mankind into a state worse with a Holy Ghost, 
than the heathens were in without it. They had rea- 
son ; we give up reason for religion, and receive a re- 
ligion unreasonable itself Is it likely God would thus 
expose us poor children to such a perilous condition ; 
Is it likely he would give us a perfect religion, by the 
ministry of his Son, and then leave us in a state as im- 
perfect and uncertain as before ? Let us conclude then, 
that we have in the Scriptures a perfect religion, con- 
sisting of just and true ideas, which " came not at any 
time by the will of man ; but which holy men of God 
spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost." When 
they were " in the Spirit," they '^ heard a voice say- 
ing, I am the first and the last," and what you see 
" write in a book, and send unto the churches." They 
are " the things which are, and the things which shall 
be hereafter." 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 



253 



Having thus seen the rise and the accomplishment of 
the promise of an universal religion under the adminis- 
tration of Jesus Christ, and having got possession of the 
book that contains the whole of that religion, let us pro- 
ceed to examine the book, and particularly with a view 
to the Holy Spirit, and his influence in religion, for " as 
many as are led by the Spirit of God, they are the sons 
of God." To give you at once my notion of the sub- 
ject, I think our apostle took his idea of the Christian 
church being " led" by the Spirit, from that favourite 
part of the history of his country so often mentioned in 
the writings of the Prophets, and so faithfully recorded 
by their first historian, Moses ; I mean God's " leading" 
the Israelites through the wilderness into the land of 
promise. Sometimes it is said simply, " God led them" 
through the wilderness. Sometimes it is said, the Holy 
Spirit led them " by the right hand of Moses." Some- 
times they are said to be led " with a cloud, and with a 
light of fire;" and in this manner the wise men of the 
east were led by a star to Jesus Christ. God in all these 
cases made use of means, and the work was no less his 
for using means to effect his purpose. In this manner I 
suppose the Holy Spirit by the Scriptures guides all good 
men. The cloud was not in the Israelites, nor was the 
star in the wise men ; but there was in them a know- 
ledge of the use and intent of these appearances, and a 
conformity of action to their own ideas. 

Here then two things rise to view in our subject ; a 
guide without us, and a disposition within us ; and the 
last seems to me to be an effect of the first, and both 
the work of one and the same spirit. Suppose a world 
without a Bible, and you have no idea of any Spirit of 
God as a spirit of religion in the inhabitants of it. Sup- 
pose on the other hand a Bible in a world without an 
inhabitant, and you have no notion of influence : the 
" Spirit of God" is there, but nothing knows or wor- 
ships him, " the earth is without form and void, and 
darkness is upon the face of the deep." If God calls for 
light, it will come ; if for land and water, they will ap- 
pear ; if for sun, and moon, and stars, they will be ; if 
for fish, and fowl, and beasts, they will appear; but 
22 



254^ THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

there will be no religion till man comes, nor then any 
revealed religion till the book and the man meet, and 
then the child of God will be " led by the Spirit of 
God." My supposition is a fact. The Bible lies about 
in many parts of the world without readers, and there lifes 
all our holy religion like Jesus dead in the sepulchre. 
There are on the contrary many places where the Bi- 
ble is read ; but it is not among men but mere animals, 
who eat and drink, and marry and give in marriage, 
and buy and sell, and build and plant, and are so full of 
these ideas, that they never attend to religious truth, 
before death comes and destroys them all. " So it was 
in the days of Noah, so it was also in the days of the Son 
of Man," and so it will be to the end of the world. In a 
word, there is no magic in the Bible to operate without 
reason and conscience ; and there is no religion in man 
without revelation. If we lay aside the Scriptures we 
have no standard to judge by ; and if we have no judg- 
ment the standard is of no use. 

Let us apply these general observations to particular 
cases, in order to understand how the Spirit of God 
" leads" all good men. We have determined, that it is 
by means of Scripture truths, and that it implies the 
exercise of some dispositions in us. I am aware of the 
questions you will ask, and I only defer stating the 
question till it comes properly before us, as it will pre- 
sently by supposing a case, which is not a mere suppo- 
sition, because it comes to pass every day. Suppose a 
a man, who had never thought of religion, to lose by 
death the first of all earthly pleasures, the agreeable 
partner of his life, or, as a prophet calls his wife, " the 
desire of his e^es." O dreadful calamity, sound fit to 
raise the dead ! " Son of man, behold, I take away 
from thee the desire of thine eyes with a stroke ! I 
spake unto the people in the morning, and at even my 
wife died." Awhile the man thunderstruck can hardly 
believe it true, and hopes against hope, till time, cruel 
time, kills his hope, and drives him to despair. The 
more he thinks, the more occasion he sees for grief 
Every thing he sees pierces him to the heart, and in 
every place a lovely picture of her that was, and the 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 255 

ghastly features of her that is no more, meet his eyes, 
and melt down all his soul in woe. The sun does not 
shine, the stars do not sparkle, the flowers do not scent, 
the world does not look as it used to do ; the world 
seems dead, his house is a tomb, and all his domestics 
dreary ghosts. Now he feels the vanity of the world, 
takes up his Bible, perhaps to look after the desire of 
his eyes, and try whether he can find any thing in her 
present state to assuage his pain. This man hath re- 
ligion to seek, and it is indifferent which end of the Bi- 
ble he begins at, either will '' lead" him right. If with 
the Prophets, they will hand him on from one to anoth- 
er, till they conduct him downward to Christ ; if with 
the Apostles, the}^ v»ill direct him upward to the same 
person, who is a " light to lighten the Gentiles, and the 
glory of the people of Israel." This man, thus led to 
Christ, will be instructed by reading his sermons, by 
observing his actions, and by examining how his apos- 
tles understood and explained his meaning, by applying 
it to several cases, both of individuals and collective 
bodies, which fell out after his death, and during their 
inspiration ; and perceiving the truth and beauty of all 
this, and finding a satisfaction in it calming his mind 
and producing in him a pleasure never experienced be- 
fore, he will become a convert to the Christian religion, 
and choose to make the truths of it the rules of his ac- 
tion, and the groimd of his hope. This man is led step 
by step to a moment in life, in which he becomes a new 
man, rises, as it were, from the dead into '' newness of 
life," and when he makes his appearance among Chris- 
tians, the question will naturally be asked, " Who hath 
begotten me this man ? Who hath brought up this 
man? Where hath he been ? Christians, come round 
this man and inquire : " he is of age, ask him, he shall 
speak for himself." By whose direction did you come 
into this Christian assembly ? His answer is ; Jesus 
Christ informed m.e, that " where two or three are 
gathered together in his name, there" is he " in the 
midst of them ;" and '' that if two" of his disciples 
" shall agree on earth as touching any thing they shall 
jask, it shall be done for them of" his Father '' which j« 



256 THE SPmiT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

in heaven." I come to join with you in worshipping God ; 
and to be instructed by you, who have studied religion 
longer than I have, in the truths contained in the Holy 
Scriptures. Ask him again, How came you, an English- 
man born near two thousand years after Christ, a Jew 
who lived and died in the Eastern part of the world, — 
how came you acquainted with Jesus Christ? His an- 
swer is, I have been lately reading his history, written 
by those who had '' heard and seen what they declar- 
ed," and who " wrote unto us that we also might have 
fellowship with them, and their fellowship was truly 
with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ." Think 
it not presumption in me, a Gentile, to appropriate to 
mj^self all the benefits of a religion, which though 
preached first to the Jews, was, " according to the com- 
mandment of the everlasting God, made known unto all 
nations for the obedience of faith." This is "made 
manifest to me by the Scriptures of the Prophets," and 
in finding Christ, " I have found him of whom Moses in 
the law and the Prophets did write ;" and the whole 
seemed to me as clear as the daylight, and as free as 
the air. Ask further. How came jou to believe the 
truth of all this ? He replies, I could not withhold my 
assent any more than I can help being warmed by ap- 
proaching a fire. The evidences of the truth of the 
Gospel stood before me ; I seemed to myself surround- 
ed with prophets and apostles : nobod}'^ asked any favour 
of me, they all bore witness to the truth of one fact, and 
I could not help yielding to the force of evidence. Ask 
him once more : This fact subverts the whole order of 
vour former course of living ; how came you to exam- 
ine a religion so utterly destructive of all your former 
sinful enjoyments ? He tells you : '' I was stript of all 
the pleasure of living, by a death in my family, which, 
though I can never cease to lament, I am obliged to con- 
fess seems to me now necessary to rouse me out of that 
dead sleep of sin in which I lay. It seems a severe 
part of the government of God, but necessary to a man 
in my condition ; and I consider it now as the language 
of one, whose absolute right to dispose of me empower- 
ed him to say, when he struck the blow, " x\wake thou 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 257^ 

that sieepest, arise from the dead, and Christ shall give 
thee light." Once more, inquire how an event, which 
some scarcely feel, made him so very unhappy ? He 
will go out of religion into a thousand subjects, as the 
accomplishments of his partner, the tenderness of his 
own feelings, and other articles of a like kind, all which 
traced back, will at last appear to have God for their 
first cause. This man hath always been a child asleep 
in the bosom of his Father, and when he woke he found 
himself in his arms. Call in now all the means used to 
" lead" this man to the spot where he now is, and ex- 
amine, which of them made this man a Christian. Was 
it any one of your prophets or apostles ? We brought 
indeed " the message which we heard of God, and de- 
clared" unto him ; but we were not acquainted with 
him till lately ; he had, when we found him, eyes to 
read, ears to hear, and understanding to judge, a con- 
science to reprove, and he was in a condition neither 
melancholy nor mad, but disposed to make use of them. 
In a word, there is a chain of events, one of which 
brings on another, and of all which God is the tirst 
cause, and if you can suppose the life of the man just 
now mentioned to consist of a chain of five thousand 
events, and that three thousand and fifty came to pass 
before he touched the Holy Scriptures, and that his 
reading them was the three thousand and fifty-first 
event, I should call three thousand and fifty, acts of God 
as the God of nature ; the three thousand and fifty-first 
an act of God as the God of grace ; and though I should 
"think him "led" all along before by the same God, yet 
I should from that moment date his being " led by the 
Spirit of God" as a Spirit of truth and holiness, reveal- 
ing himself in Scripture as the Saviour of sinners, and 
in no other way. 

When the Spirit of God "saves a soul from death," 
by "converting a sinner from the errour of his way," 
what doth he ? Doth he create any new senses or fa- 
culties, new eyes in the body, or new powers in the 
soul ? Certainly not ; for as there is no want of any 
new powers, so if they were, they would not be what 
Christ came to redeem, nor would they need sanctifioa- 
22* 



258 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

tion. The whole work of the Spirit seems to me to 
consist in two things : the one a proposing of the truths 
of religion, and this is done in the Holy Scriptures : the 
other a disposing of the mind to admit the truth, and 
this is done by means of various sorts, by prosperity, by 
adversity, by education, by conversation, by sickness, 
and by a thousand other methods, parts of a whole com- 
plicated government, of which God is the first cause. 
In order to explain the subject, or rather (it becomes 
me to say of such a subject) my notion of it ; I beg your 
attention to three reflections of reason. Scripture, and 
experience. 

I call it reasonable to give God as much glory for 
bringing an event to pass by means, as without them ; 
yea, in some sense more. I will explain myself. It is 
the opinion of some Christians, that the Holy Ghost re- 
generates a soul immediately, that is, suddenly, and with- 
out any thing between himself and the soul, and they 
are zealous to support this idea of regeneration for the 
very laudable purpose of securing all the honour of this 
work to God. We praise the motive, for too much care 
cannot be taken to render to God a glory so justly his 
due : but we cannot see that the work is less his for his 
making use of means to effect it ; for whose are the 
means but his own ? The more means he thinks prop- 
er to use, the more he displays his glorious perfections. 
In all his other works he makes use of means. He 
warms us by means of fire, he feeds us by means of 
bread, he refreshes us in the day by air and in the night 
by sleep, he creates us and brings us into being by 
means of our parents, and he removes us by means of 
diseases. Name, if it be possible, a single event in the 
whole world brought to pass without means. If we go 
from the body to the mind, still the same wise order 
prevails. Our eyes distinguish colours, but colours are 
not God, but rays of light differently disposed. Our ears 
distinguish sounds, but sounds are only air. Our feel- 
ings find out hardness, softness, rough, smooth, and so 
on. There is not a single thought, in all the multitude 
we have in our minds, which hath not been brought 
thfther by some means or other. What is more, every 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. S59 

thought is connected with another thought, and that 
with another, and so on, till we are lost in the distance 
or the crowd. Now, we ask. Is that which God doth by 
means less his doing than if it were performed without 
means ? Is not the last effect as much his as the first 1 
Who gave us this year a plentiful harvest? You say, 
God. You say right, because God formed six thousand 
years ago sun and earth, air and water, wheat and bar- 
ley, and fixt all in such a state that they came to you 
last harvest exactly in such proportion as he at first ap- 
pointed them. One great argument for the truth of the 
Christian religion is, that it exactly resembles the world 
of nature, and so proves itself to be the work of the 
same God ; and if it were not so, if religion were not 
like other things, which we are sure God made, we 
should have no certain rules to know, when we received 
a religion, whether it were a body of truth coming from 
God to make us happy, or a set of errours contrived by 
wicked men to make us miserable. Did ever any man 
conceive that the sun, or the air, or the water, or the 
trees, or fish, fowl, and cattle, were the invention and 
production of man ? Nobody ever thought so. Why ? 
Because they have characters of size, shape, duration, 
and perfection, above all the skill and power of man to 
produce. Bring forth ten thousand things to view hav- 
ing the same characters of perfection in their kind, and 
we instantly know the maker ; but produce something 
with different characters, and the author becomes 
doubtful, and it is no further probable that he created it 
than as it resembles his other works. Apply this to 
our subject. If God regenerates us by means, if he 
makes us wise by informing us of truth, and good by 
proposing good reasons to us for being so, then religion 
resembles his other works ; but if we be wise without 
truth, and good without motive, then a new work ap- 
pears without the characters of his other works, and 
consequently without any evidence to persuade us it is 
his. Thus, reason seems to plead for the truth of our 
notion of the work of the Holy Spirit. 

The chief objection against this account seems to me 
a strong reason io favour of it. If this account be true, 



260 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD xMEN. 

say some, the work of the Spirit may be explained arid 
described as clearly as any other part of religion, and 
we shall know what the work of the Spirit is ; whereas 
we have been taught to believe that the work is a mys- 
tery, which no man knoweth, no, not he that receiveth 
it, and this notion seems confirmed by this text, " The 
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound 
thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whith- 
er it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit." 
In answer to this, and every other objection taken from 
Scripture, we have proposed to make a second reflec- 
tion on the language of Scripture concerning this sub- 
ject, and we shall put the passages into two classes. 

In the first we put such as speak of this work under 
figures or similitudes ; as where the Spirit is said to be 
like wind^ fire^ water. All Scriptures of this kind are 
explained by one distinction between the nature and the 
effects of things. It is one thing to know the nature of 
fire, and air and water, and it is another to know the ef- 
fects they produce. No man fully knows the first ; but 
the last are as clear as daylight. Is there a man in this 
assembly, who doth not know what effect fire will pro- 
duce in wood or water, and wind in mill work, and so 
on ? When our Lord said. Every one that is born of the 
Spirit is so as you, Nicodemus, are in the wind, he 
knows the effects, and that knowledge is sufficient to di- 
rect his actions ; my instructions are intended to make 
men good men, and not philosophers : observe, it was 
Nicodemus who said. How can these things be 1 And 
the reproof given him by Jesus Christ would have been 
improper, had the subject been a mystery ; " Art thou a 
master of Israel and knowest not these things ?" We 
speak that we do knozv, and testify that we have seen. 
The subject of their conversation was not the nature of 
the Spirit, but his influences in religion. Now, said 
our Lord, the religion I teach is spiritual ; it doth not 
stand like yours in " meats and drinks, and divers wash- 
ings, and carnal ordinances imposed until the time of 
reformation for the purifying of the flesh," but in ef- 
fects upon the mind and heart : you see no temple, no 
priesthood, no sacrifices in my religion : let not this of- 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD ME^^ 261 

fend you ; my religion resembles the wind, which no 
man ever saw, but the effects of which you and all oth- 
er men perfectly understand. " The wind bloweth 
where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but 
canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it g-oetli : 
so is every one that is born of the Spirit." In this man- 
ner expound all the passages that speak of the Spirit's 
work under similitudes, and you will find no difficulty in 
them. 

In a second class I put all such Scriptures as describe 
the work of the Spirit. The apostle Peter had seen a 
great deal of this work, and one day of his life, such a 
day as that in which " three thousand souls were add- 
ed," produced more and better experiments than ordi- 
nary teachers have an opportunity of seeing in their 
whole life. He saw religion in every form, and exam- 
ined single conversions, separately and alone, and hia 
whole life was a course of experiments, a part of which 
are recorded in Acts ; and we have reason to believe, 
though we have no account of the twenty-four last years 
of his life in Scripture, that he continued to old age in 
the exercise of instructing and converting mankind, or, 
as our Lord calls it, " feeding the lambs and the sheep" 
of Christ. The testimony of such a man is extremely 
respectable. It is a testimony of inspiration explained 
and confirmed by experiment. Now he says, that the 
''strangers scattered throughout Pontus," and other 
countries, who were " elect through sanctification of the 
Spirit," were " born again of incorruptible seed by the 
word of God, which word by the Gospel was preach- 
ed unto them." This account of regeneration is part- 
ly literal, and partly figurative. The Gospel is the 
word of God . . . the Gospel was preached unto you . .,. 
these are literally true ; the Gospel containing the word 
of God which was preached unto you, is an "incorrupt- 
ible seed," of which you were born again ; these are 
figurative expressions, and must be expounded by the 
literal terms, and clearly mean a dependence of the 
three excellences that constitute a regenerate man on 
the three principal parts of religion, in which they had 
been instructed. The Gospel proposes a set of cleaf 



2B2 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD~ MEN. 

truths : Christians examine and believe these truthi^ 
The Gospel proposes a set of motives : Christians feel 
these motives ,• fear hell, desire heaven, love holiness, 
and so on. The Gospel proposes a set of rules to live 
by : Christians reduce these rules to practice. Chris- 
tians thus are born into a new world, having the new 
powers necessary to live in that world : they have new 
objects and new ideas : they have new motives and new 
feelings : they have new laws and a new life. The 
apostle not only saw all this in others, but he felt all 
this exemplified in himself. He was in the exercise of 
his trade, '• casting a net into the sea," when a person 
vralking on the beach called to him, and said, " Follow 
me, and I will make you a fisher of men." This word 
of the Lord was like that at the creation, " Let there be 
light ;" and the history of the rest of Peter's existence 
may be contained in this word, "There was light." 
When he afterwards fell into a swoon, and returned 
again to sin and to fishing, he was "begotten again, un- 
to a lively hope," not without means, but " by the re- 
surrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." Here is the 
work, the whole ordinary work of the Holy Spirit, but 
all wrought by means : these strangers "purified their 
souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit," that is 
through the knowledge of things " reported unto them, 
by them that preach the Gospel with the Holy Ghost 
sent down from heaven," to enable the preachers to 
speak the divers tongues of these strangers, and of all 
others to whom they were sent, that so their faith might 
stand on what they clearly understood. 

Strictly speaking, there are two kinds of passages in 
the New Testament descriptive of this work : the first 
are short, and are a sort of first principles, and these are 
mostly in the Epistles ; as " If any man be in Christ he is 
a new creature . . . my preaching was in demonstration of 
the Spirit . . , your faith stands in the power of God . . . 
God called you unto the fellowship of his Son . . . God 
shined in our hearts . . . the power is not of us, but of 
God." This is the first sort of passages; but there is a 
second class, which show us these first principles in real 
action, and this sort is in the Gospels, zlnd in the Acts 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN# 263 

»f the apostles, and by these the former are expounded. 
What would you know of a tree by seeing it in its first 
principles ? Could you know an oak by seeing an 
acorn, or a briar and a hawthorn by seeing hips and 
haws ? An acorn is an oak in principle, and an oak is an 
acorn drawn out in practice. Explain the short princi- 
ples in the Epistles to the Corinthians by the history of 
the conversion of the Corinthians in the Acts of the 
Apostles. Paul's preaching was in demonstration of the 
Spirit, that is, he was " pressed in Spirit" at Corinth, 
" and testified to Jews and Greeks that Jesus was 
Christ," and " he reasoned in the synagogue every Sab- 
bath." The faith of the Corinthians stood in the " pow- 
er of God," that is, the reasoning of Paul " persuaded 
the Jews and the Greeks," who " hearing, believed." 
If any Corinthian be in Christ, he, the man, is a new 
creature ; that is, the Corinthians, who had been hea- 
thens and Jews, when they " believed on the Lord, were 
baptized into that new and holy religion, Christianity. 
God shined in our hearts, I planted, Apollos watered ; 
that is, I '' continued a year and six months teaching the 
word of God among you," and Apollos, after he had 
been instructed by Aquila and Priscilla, " helped them 
much which had believed through grace, for he might- 
ily convinced the Jews, shewing by the Scriptures that 
Jesus was Christ." The apostle had a right to conclude, 
that though they were '• labourers together with God," 
yet the Corinthians were " God's husbandry, God's build- 
ing." God created Paul and ApolloS ; he converted the 
one in an extraordinary way, and the other by ordinary 
means of instruction ; l3ut Aquila and Priscilla were his, 
the Scripture was his ; " neither is he that planteth any 
thing, neither he that watereth, but God that giveth the 
increase." In this manner expound Scriptures by them- 
selves, and observe all along that it is granted on all 
hands, the conversion of a sinner is the work of the Ho- 
ly Spirit, and all the honour of it due to him, and the 
only inquiry is, whether he doth this work with means 
or without them, and if without them, what is the use, 
the pure and proper use of means. 

This brings us to our last reflection on Christian ex- 



264 THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

perience. If means have no place in the Christian re- 
ligion till after the production of something in the soul 
containing the whole new man, then the use of means 
is only to nourish and cherish this new principle, that 
is to say, they are to a Christian what air and earth and 
moisture are to an acorn. All Christians seem to act as 
if they thought the means appointed to produce the end, 
and the fitness of the means is the support of Christian 
action. On this principle we educate our children, be- 
cause instruction seems to us a proper method of pro- 
ducing in them knowledge. On this principle we read 
and expound the Scriptures in public ; not that the 
Scriptures want any expounding, to cool and attentive 
minds, but because the minds of most men are not in 
such a state, but blinded with prejudice, custom, and 
passion, and because we know such a mind is not pre- 
pared to attend to reason. On this principle we ad- 
dress the Gospel not only to the righteous and well-dis- 
posed, but also to men of a quite different character. 
One great argument in defence of our holy religion is, 
that it is fitted not only to saints, but also to sinners, 
even to such as are in the last and most deplorable sta- 
ges of vice. If you say, God works in the means ; this 
is what Y/e plead for ; if yon affirm on the contrary that 
he works immediately, then there is no more fitness in 
instructing the ignorant, and reasoning with the wick- 
ed, and expecting knowledge and reformation to follow, 
than there would be in planting and watering flints and 
pebbles, and expecting them to grow into oaks. Go 
further, go back to the regeneration of any one Chris- 
tian in this assembly, and divide yourselves into two 
parts. Some of you do not know the time of your con- 
version ; that is as much as to sa}^, the work of the Spir- 
it was so connected with other events, that one thing 
brought on another, till all together issued in your con- 
version, for you are a sincere convert to the faith of 
Christ. Others of you resemble the man supposed some 
time ago, and you know what events fell out when you 
became Christians ; but the connexion oT an effect with 
a cause destroys the notion of immediate influence. One 
says, such a Providence set me a thinking ; another 



THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEX. 2G5 

says, Such a discourse set me a repenting ; a third says, 
Such a book gave me information that produced com- 
fort. All of us believe, the means of religion are high- 
ly fitted to answer their end, and the certainty of ob- 
taining the end in the use of means is the sun that rules 
the day, and the moon that rules the night, of life. 

We cannot conclude this subject without two reflec- 
tions. First, we perceive a wonderful inclination in 
Christians toward something in religion so sublime as 
not to be understood ; whereas the true sublimity of re- 
ligion lies in its plainness, as the true excellence and 
dignity of man consists in his becoming such a plain man 
as Jesus Christ was. This inclination is a remnant of 
the old education given this country by monks and 
priests, whose majesty stood in the credulousness of 
their followers. They made creeds, or articles to be 
believed, and gave them to our forefathers to say over. 
You do not understand them, said they, but we do ; and, 
while they were doing that, the creed-makers ran aAvay 
with their houses and lands. Let us renounce this dis- 
position, and let us believe nothing but what we under- 
stand. 

Lastly, we observe with great pleasure that all Chris- 
tians allow the Spirit of God is a Holy Spirit; and even 
they who think him hidden, think they have no right 
to conclude he is where they suppose, till the fruits of 
a holy life declare it. Should a man, who had lived 
wickedly all his days, be intoxicated with liquor over 
night, and regenerr^ted at six next morning by an imme- 
diate work of the Spirit, no Christians would believe it 
that day, and should he, like Saul, "• assay to join himself 
to the disciples, they" would be " all afraid of him, and 
not believe that he was a disciple," till some Barna- 
bas" should declare two things unto them ; one, 
" how the Lord had spoken to him ;" and the other, 
" how he had boldly preached at Damascus ;" till he 
had given substantial proofs l>y his conduct that his pre- 
tensions were true and real. If an extraordinary con- 
version was not credible without proof, how much less 
are ordinary changes ? The proof of proofs is laid by 
the Hoiy Spirit where it ought to be. '' If ye be Icfl 
23 



266 -THE SPIRIT OF GOD GUIDES ALL GOOD MEN. 

by the Spirit, ye are not under the law, for the fruit of 
the Spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suifering, gentleness, 
goodness, faith, meekness, temperance ; against such 
there is no law." Let not " a man think himself to be 
something when he is nothing : but let every man prove 
his own work, and then shall he have rejoicing in him- 
self alone, and not in another man." God grant us this 
grace I To him be honour and glory forever. Anien. 



DISCOURSE XIV. 

FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

lAT CHESTERFORD.] 



GALATIANS V. 6. 

Faith worketh by love. 

Let not my first words alarm you. Do any of you 
know what an abstract word is ? To speak more exact- 
ly, Had ever any one of you an abstract idea ? Words 
are names of things ; abstract words are names of ab- 
stract things ; and abstract ideas are perceptions of the 
things so named. Have you any idea of whiteness, 
hardness, wisdom, love ? You know what a white cloud, 
a white rose, a hard wood, a hard hand, a wise man, a 
loving child is ; but you have no idea of any one of these 
things separate from the bodies, of which they are prop- 
erties. Try now, whether you can conceive of white- 
ness or wisdom alone and apart from every thing except 
itself. Yet these are very convenient words, and ex- 
press many real qualities ; and there is no danger in the 
use of them, except when they are supposed to stand 
for something which is not to be found ; and should that 
something be a part of religion, we should be perplexed 
and confused, '' ever learning, and never able to come 
to the knowledge of the truth," the folly of which is 
♦'manifest unto all men." 

Observe the t^^t : " In Christ neither circumcision 



268 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

av«TiIeth nny thing, nor uncircumcision, but faith which 
worketh by love." Circumcision, uncircumcision, faith, 
love, these are names of things not to be found alone 
and apart ; but circumcision is put for the condition of 
the Jews, uncircumcision for that of the Gentiles, who 
had not submitted to that rite of the religion of Moses : 
faith signiiies belief of the truths of the Christian reli- 
gion, and love, the instrument of faith, that friendly dis- 
position, which a belief of the truths taught in the 
Christian religion produceth toward all mankind. It is 
as if the apostle had said. If you Jews believe the Gos- 
pel, you will love the Gentiles; if you Gentiles believe 
the Gospel, you will love the Jews ; and if both of you 
believe the Gospel you will love God, and all your fel- 
low-creatures ; for in the Gospel of Christ, what you 
were by birth, education, and Avorldly distinctions avail 
nothing; tlie great point is, Do you believe the truths 
of the Christian religion ? You need not hesitate about 
this ; a belief of these truths never fails to produce the 
kind offices of love. 

I speak thus, because many Christians perplex them- 
selves in that necessary duty prescribed by our apostle, 
'■'• Examine yourselves whether ye be in the faith." 
They turn their attention inward, and look for faith, and 
not being able to find any thing abstracted, apart and 
alone, that answers to their general notion of faith, they 
rashly conclude against themselves, that they are not 
Christians, and so go willingly down into a dungeon of 
doubts and fears, and lie there waiting for execution, as 
if faith wrought by despair. " Examine yourself wheth- 
er you be in the faith," is equal to saying. Examine 
yourself whether you be in '' temper ;" and as in the 
latter case you would not inquire after calmness, or mod- 
eration, but whether you j^ourself were calm and mod- 
erate ; so in the former case you should not search for 
faith as for something separate from 3'ourself, but incor- 
porating it with yourself, you should say, here on the 
table lies the Gospel, Do I believe it? or, if this be too 
much, say, Here in the Gospel, in the twenty-fifth chap- 
ter of Matthew, lies a description of the day of judg- 
ment ; do I believe this^ to be true ? 



PAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. ' 269 

Simple and artless as this may appear, it was, howev- 
er, the principal question, the constant declaration, and 
the perpetual description in primitive religion. Jesus 
Christ said to those who came to him for healing, " Be- 
lieve ye that I am able to do this ? . . . Dost thou be- 
lieve on the Son of God? ... If thou canst believe, all 
things are possible to him that believeth ;" for believ- 
ing him to be the Messiah was the ordinary condition of 
his working a miracle. After his resurrection, people 
were admitted to profess Christianity only on a declara- 
tion of faith. " May I be baptized ?" said the eunuch. 
" If thou believest, thou mayest," replied Philip : '•'■ and 
he answered and said, 1 believe that Jesus Christ is the 
Son of God." The declarations concerning Christians 
run all throughout the New Testament in the same 
style ; and in the same manner Christians are described, 
as, ••' Believers were added to the Lord, be thou an ex- 
ample of the believers, he that believeth on me hath 
everlasting life ;" and, to say all in one word, the com- 
mission, which Christ gave his apostles to preach the 
Gospel, divides the world into only two parts; "He that 
believeth shall be saved, but he that believeth not shall be 
damne.l." This is the constant style of Scripture. You 
see, Christians are not described in general by their ac- 
tions and affections, but by their faith. It is not said, 
they are the industrious, the frugal, the honest, the sup- 
porters of the poor, though all these are true ; but thej^ 
are named believers, because this expresses the point 
in which they all agree, the distinguishing excellence of 
their character, and that disposition from which all oth- 
er good dispositions proceed. We have therefore, rea- 
son to affirm that faith and holiness are inseparable ; and 
it is to the establishing of this truth that I shall this eve- 
ing address myself May God crown our labour with 
success ! 

Faith is belief, and Christian faith is "belief of the 
truth" of Christianity. Some Christians believe a ^q.w 
of the truths of Christianity, and their "faith is weak," 
because though they believe some truths, yet they do not 
believe others, which perhaps they have overlooked, or 
against which it may be thej'^ are prejudiced : their Ian*- 



270 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

guage ought to be, " Lord, I believe, help thou mine 
unbelief." Lord I believe thou wilt judge the world, 
but forgive me for not believing that thou '' wast lifted 
up," that " whosoever believeth in thee should not 
perish, but have eternal life," for I fear I was excepted. 
Others believe all the truths of Christianity, and they 
are '^ strong in the faith," and they say, ^' This is a 
faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Jesus 
Christ came into the world to save sinners ; for this is 
the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and 
this life is in his Son ;" and '' these things arc written 
that we may know we have eternal life." The truths 
of the Christian religion resemble the stones of a well- 
constructed arch thrown over an impassable gulf, to 
serve for a bridge for travellers, and each truth sup- 
ports and is supported by another truth, and all together 
make an assemblage of convenience, strength, and beau- 
ty. Let us not consider faith as the key-stone, that binds 
the two sweeps together ,• but let us consider it as a 
greater or less degree of knowledge of building an arch 
in the travellers who pass over it. The builder will 
have no fear, and travellers who understand his princi- 
ples, or believe his report will have no fear ; but they, 
who neither understand the principles of the builder, 
nor give him much credit for his report, nray^ j^ea, must 
go over with fear and trembling. 

Let us come to particulars. There are some t7^ushs 
ri}hich you need not believe^ I mean, the belief of them 
is not necessary to salvation. A great scholar, and an 
excellent Christian in one of the Protestant churches 
abroad, printed a book, in which he said, Jesus Christ 
was born at Jerusalem. A friend asked him, wheth- 
er he was not mistaken ? He replied. No, certainly. 
However he was soon convinced, that Jesus Christ was 
not born at the city of Jerusalem, but at a village called 
Bethlehem. He must have known this ; but he had 
forgot it; yet he never forgot Christ, but believed his 
Gospel, and imitated his example. Suppose a man 
should not know a hundred such truths concerning the 
year, and the day, and the place of the bi*rth of Christ, 
the form of his person, the name of the mountain on 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 27 1 

which he was crucified, the years of hi^ ministry, the 
order in which the Gospels and Epistles were written, 
What then ? Nothing. No such truths are proposed 
to us as grounds of our hope, and rules of our practice. 
By believing the Gospel, then, we do not mean a belief 
01 all the incidents that fell in occasionally, and beside 
the main design ; so that you may easil}^ account for thei 
conduct of your teachers, when they affirm that the 
knowledge and belief of these circumstances is not the 
faith spoken of by the apostle in our text. This kind 
of knowledge, far from '' working by love," often works 
by levity, intemperance, superstition, and cruelty. When 
Jesus Christ said, "If ye believe not that 1 am he, ye 
shall die in jour sins ;" how hard would our lot have 
been, if he meant to say. If ye believe not that I was 
born at Bethlehem in the tribe of Judah, in the days 
of king Herod, in the reign of Augustus Caesar, and 
when Cyrenius was governour of Syria, " ye shall die 
in your sins !" Set your hearts at ease on all these 
subjects, and when you examine whether 3'ou be in the 
faitb, leave out that great mass of information, which 
comes under the description of incidents. If j^ou have 
time and opportunity, examine every circumstance, the 
pleasure will amply repay the labour, for ail knowledge 
brings pleasure ; but you may know the true character 
of a benefactor without knowing any of the flowers that 
adorn his garden. • 

As there are truths, which you need not believe, so 
there are truths which you cannot helievc because they 
are either not told, or not directed to you. It is true 
of some of 3^ou, that you Thomas, or you John such 
an one, are a good man, a believer in Christ, and will be 
saved; but who ever expected a Bible of this kind? 
If a man understands by believing the Gospel, believing 
something that is not in the book, and which, had it 
been there, would have marked it with folly, he may 
continue to read, and look, and search through life, he 
will never find, for this good reason, it is not there. 
Even a great number of articles, which are written, are 
not addressed to us. When Jesus Christ said, " I give 
thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoev- 



272 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE, 

er thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, 
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed 
in heaven," it would be intolerable not to observe, that 
this was addressed personally to Peter, and not to us. 
Under pretence that it was not addressed to us, but to 
Peter, the Bishop of Rome pretends it was addressed to 
him, as the successor of Peter, and on this presumption 
he makes laws, and dispenses with the breach of them, 
and his right to do so is allowed by many, merely be- 
cause he hath sealed his instruments with swords and 
keys. The Bishop of Rome hath set us the example of 
thus abusing the Holy Scriptures, and we have been too 
faithful followers of this blind guide. Is ©ne ashamed 
of the profession of the Gospel ? He satisfies his con- 
science by saying, Jesus " charged his disciples that they 
should tell no man that he was Jesus the Christ." Is 
another indolent, and an enemy to free inquiry ? He 
justifies his conduct by saying, " If any man shall sa}^ un- 
to you, Lo, here is Christ, or there ; believe it not. If 
they shall say unto you. Behold, he is in the desert, go 
not forth : Behold he is in the secret chambers, believe 
it not. For there shall arise false Christs, and false 
prophets." If another lives carelessly, and expects in- 
i^piration without study, he says, it is written, '' Take no 
fliought how or what ye shall speak ; settle it in your 
hearts, not to meditate before, what ye shall answer, 
for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall 
speak, for it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your 
Father which speaketh in you." None of these people 
consider the circumstances of time, place, person, and 
so on, nor the meaning of such passages as this, '' Veri- 
ly I say unto, this generation shall not pass away till all 
be fulfilled." Should a man believe all the passages of 
Scripture of this sort, we should not therefore think him 
a believer of the Gospel, but an officious intermeddler, 
who was weak enough to thrust himself into business 
with which he had no concern, and which the master 
of the family appointed other servants to, do. Faith 
of this sort doth not " v^-^ork by love ;" but by idleness, 
timorousness, presumption, and fury. It is on this un~ 
distinguishing ground, that some Christians perplex 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 27S 

themselves, and distress their friends, by puzzling the 
Gospel, and bewildering honest but unwary travellers ; 
nor considering, that it is not enough for an article to be 
true, it must be revealed, and it must be addressed to 
me, before it can become a necessary article of my 
faith. When therefore we propose^&uths for the ground 
of your hope, and the rules of your lives, we do not 
mean inferences drawn from the Gospel, false or true ; 
nor do we mean truths taught along with the Gospel, 
but not addressed to you. 

This is the proper place for us to observe what the 
Scripture calls the faith of devils. The apostle James 
saith, " Thou believest there is one God : thou doest 
well : the devils also believe, and tremble." A Chris- 
tian believes there is a holy God, and he trembles, be- 
cause, being convinced of his own impurity, he is per- 
suaded God is the patron and protector of holiness, and 
the punisher of sin. Hence he infers, that he is in no 
better state than that of devils ; they '^ also believe, and 
tremble." The inference is not fair for three reasons. 
First, the trembling man is one to whom God addresseth 
the glad tidings of salvation, but these tidings were nev- 
er addressed to devils, and if they believe the history of 
our salvation, it is only as we believe the history of 
their destruction, with this difference,^ — our obstinacy 
may make their history ours, but their utmost efforts 
can never make our history theirs. Secondly, the scope 
and design of the apostle was not to alarm Christians by 
showing them how much they were like fallen spirits, 
but by convincing them that faith in revealed truths 
could not possibly be unproductive of effects. For this 
purpose he introduces a supposed man among the " bre- 
thren :" not a believer ; but a man sajdng he had faith, 
when he had it not ; for in the apostle's account, faith 
was that to a profession of Christianity, which the soul 
was to the human body, and he reasons, that as the bo- 
dy without life was judged a mere carcase, so a profess- 
ion of religion, without the belief of religion, was a 
dead, unanimated thing. He inquires what, on his prin- 
ciples, the brethren could say to such a vain man ? " He 
may say he hath faith, and hath not works :" but any 



274 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

one of you may say, " Shew me thy faith without thy 
works," and as he cannot do this, you may inform him, 
that faith without works is dead, that his profession of 
faith resembles a carcase, it not only hath not such a 
life as devils have, but it hath no life at all, it is dead. 
The apostle theref;^re is not speaking of believers, and 
of their likeness to the fallen ang-els, but of unbelievers, 
who boasted of a faith which they had not. Hence, 
thirdly, appears the propriety of introducing the belief 
of devils. You, " vain man," you profess yourself a be- 
liever of the Gospel ; but you boast of what you have 
not. You have not such a faith as we have, profitable 
to the " naked," and to those who are " destitute of dai- 
ly food." You have not such a faith as Rahab had ; 
she justified her belief of the message by respecting the 
messengers. You have not such a faith as Abraham 
had ; he believed God, and respected him as a friend. 
You have not such a faith as the devils have ; they be- 
lieve the justice of God, and dread him as an ene- 
my. You say you " do believe there is one God." 
Very well, and I say in return that you do not, for all 
belief produces effects. Had you been a fallen angel, 
you would have trembled : had you been an Abraham, 
you would have been a friend of God ; had you been a 
Christian, you would have been a friend to the poor ; 
but you are nothing but a vain man boasting of what 
you have hot. What is there in all this to terrify Chris- 
tians, seeing it is impossible their faith in the Gospel 
should'resemble the faith of devils, to whom the glad 
tidings of salvation were never so much as proposed. 

To return. As we cannot believe what is not report- 
ed, and as we ought not to appropriate what is not ad- 
dressed to us, so neither can we believe truths which 
are directed to us, unless we attend to them. Is it im- 
aginable that all such as repeat the belief, and say, 
" I believe in God the Father Almighty, and in Jesus 
Christ, who suffered under Pontius Pilate :" I say. Is it 
credible that all who repeat this creed believe any 
thing, or know any thing about Pontius Pila'te ? Why 
then do they repeat it ? They take it for granted : but 
let us remember, a truth taken upon trust without ex- 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 275 

amining, is no truth in regard to him who takes it, and 
it worketh in him exactly as he takes it, that is as a 
prejudice, and not as a truth. Should one man give 
another diamonds for pebbles, the latter taking them on 
trust, would value them as pebbles, and sell a bushel 
for eight pence, the price of pebbles. We wonder 
when we hear people, who profess to believe all the 
articles of the Christian faith, deny every article both 
in words and actions. Let us cease to wonder; the 
truths of religion are no truths to them, but mere preju- 
dices of education, which they have taken as they found, 
without suspecting them to be false, or proving them to 
be true. When I speak of inattention to the truth of an 
article of faith, I do not mean inattention to the article, 
but inattention to the truth or the falsehood of it. Let 
me explain my meaning by a similitude. Should I ask 
you, how high you think the tenth elm timber on the 
right hand side of such a row is, probably the true an- 
swer would be. We have seen the tree a thousand 
times, but never thought of the exact height of it. 
Thus we may have heard of truths all our days, and 
have talked of them, and yet never have thought of 
them in this point of light : we have supposed them 
true, or rather, we have thought nothing about them. 
If we may judge by the lives of most men, we must be- 
lieve this to be the case. Had they examined religion, 
and found it false, they would scorn to be called Chris- 
tians, for it would be equal to calling themselves hypo- 
crites, and they would be above baptizing their chil- 
dren into a profession of falsehood. Had they, on the 
contrary, by examining Christianity, found it true, they 
could not live in the neglect of it. We must therefore 
conclude, for there is no other way of accounting for 
their conduct, that they have taken religipn on trust, 
and value it as they value other prejudices. When 
Lydia heard the conversation of the apostle Paul, she 
'"' attended unto the things which were spoken," she fix- 
ed her mind on what he said, and this bent of the mind 
is well described by the wise man : " My son, attend to 
my words : incline thine ear unto my sayings. Let them 
not depart from thine eyes : keep them in the midst of 



276 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

thine heart. For they are life unto those that find them, 
and health to all their flesh." The attention which we 
pay to truth, ought to be proportioned to the importance 
of it ; and it will always be proportioned to our opinion 
of the importance of it. What we think of consequence, 
we shall certainly pay great attention to, and what we 
think trifling we shall not much heed ; it may be true, 
it may not be true, it does not much signify to us. Ex- 
amine mankind on this article, and you will allovi^, if 
they spend six days in eager pursuit of the world, and 
on the Lord's day only a drowsy hour or two in a place 
of worship, they have neither attended to the vanity of 
the world, nor to the importance of religion. With 
them eating and drinking, buying and selling, and get- 
ting gain, are matters of the utmost importance, and 
whether there be a God, or a heaven, or a hell, or a 
a judgment to come, are matters that deserve little or 
no notice ; they may be, they may not be, it does not 
much signify whether they be facts or fables. It is a 
shame to call the talk of such men a profession of faith, 
for what they call faith doth not "work by love" of any 
thing but sin. Certainly our apostle did not mean to 
say, " Faith worketh by love" of sensuality and sin ; a 
persuasion that God is the chief good, worketh by love 
to sin as the chief good ! 

You cannot believe what you do attend to, un- 
less it appear to you to be true ; and the more closely 
you fix your attention on what appears to be false, and 
the more you try to believe it, the more fully will you 
feel yourself unable to believe, even though all your 
worldly interest should be at stake. Falsehood may 
conceal itself under appearances of truth, and truth may 
be disguised under appearances of error : but should 
these appearances be taken off, and religion and sin be 
placed before us in their true colours, it would not be 
in the power of the worst of us to hate God and love sin, 
to '' believe a lie" and to disbelieve " those things in 
which" Christians " have been instructed." Observe an 
expression of the apostle Paul. He informs the Thessa- 
lonians, that there should " come a falling away" among 
Christians. He represents this under the figure of a 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 277 

*^man of sin, setting in the temple of God," not as a 
man of sin, but '' as God" with '' signs, and lying won- 
ders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness ;" 
and he represents such as fall away from the " belief of 
the truth" to the " believing of a lie" as being under 
" strong delusion." This is the constant method of er- 
ror ; it conceals itself under an appearance of truth, and 
by such means sits easy on a conscience that would oth- 
erwise be unhappy. Now, if we be able to prove that 
the Christian religion is true, and that it hath certain 
characters, marks, or tokens of its truth, so clearly im- 
pressed upon it that they cannot be denied, and that 
these recommendations of itself are so forcible that they 
cannot be resisted, — what must we say of that man, who 
constantly avoids them, and contrives to keep out of the 
way of this irresistible beauty ? He must see the sun 
if he comes up above ground, and therefore he chooses 
the life of a mole, and spends his days in burrowing un- 
der ground, burying all his time and all his talents in 
emplo3^ments of a momentary life. 

There is in the Christian religion every character of 
truth : it resembles the God from whom it came. At- 
tend to it for a moment in two or three points of light. 
Suppose the Gospel to be the direct contrary of what it 
is, and try how it would sit upon your minds. You 
know it must run thus : Thou shalt hate God with all 
thine heart, and with all thy strength, and thou shalt 
hate thy neighbour as thyself. Jesus Christ hated God 
and man, and God so hated the world as to give Jesus 
to embolden men to express their hatred of God and 
one another. Moses and Aaron were two " idle" men, 
who led their nation out of Egypt, settled religion and 
government among them, and wrote five books, called 
Scripture, only because they did not know what to do 
with their time. All the Jewish prophets were fools, 
and their " spiritual men" were " madmen." Jesus and 
his apostles were " pestilent fellows," and " movers of 
sedition" throughout the world. "All things come 
alike to all ; as is the good, so is the sinner, and he that 
sweareth, as he that feareth an oath." " A man hath 
no pre-eminence above a beast ; as the one dieth, so di- 
21 



278 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

eth the other." There is " nothing better for a man, 
than that he shonld eat and drink, and delij^ht his sen- 
ses." Suppose the whole book of Scripture to consist 
of such principles, and to contain the histories and re- 
commendation of snch practices ; I ask. Could you be- 
lieve, and love, and practise this Gospel, and dare you 
read it to your children and recommend it to them? 
The Gospel then hath a character of "holiness," and 
it appears to you that holiness is a character of a true 
religion. 

Examine the Gospel on the article of likeness to God, 
from whom it pretends to come. Observe with what un- 
jielding- dignity and majesty it prescribes to all man- 
kind, consulting no man's passions and sinful interests, 
how distinguished soever his rank may be. Herod is a 
" fox," Caesar is " a lion," the " princes" of this world 
know nothing, " priests" have no neighbours, scribes 
and Pharisees are " h3^pocrites," the masters of the 
world are " filled with all unrighteousness," the whole 
world " lieth in wickedness," and " the soul that sinneth 
it shall die ; as I live, saith the Lord God, the soul that 
sinnsth it shall die." The same majesty runs through 
evevy thing said to the righteous, and the whole book 
is the language of a master, who hath nobody above 
him, and who speaks every thing like one who had 
been accustomed to command and to be obeyed. Now, 
doth it not appear to 3^ou that a religion coming from 
God, ought to speak thus, and that if it spoke otherwise, 
and abounded in compliances and civilities, and accom- 
modations, it would render itself contemptible and un- 
w^orthy of credit? Here then is another character of a 
true religion ; and it appears to you to be such a char- 
acter as a religion from heaven must necessarily have. 

Observe the character oi" goodness. The Christian 
religion professes to be built on the love, the everlast- 
ing love of God. It comes to us in a way, which evi- 
dently proves, that God consulted our pence more than 
his own splendour: the latter is in no danger; the first 
had been torn up by the roots. Had God formed the 
method of conveyance with a mere design to display his 
greatness, all the powers of nature would have been too 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 279 

little to express it : thunderings the most terrible, light- 
nings the most dreadful, winds, and rains, and earth- 
quakes, and hurricanes the most horrible, angels the 
most magnificent ; all would have been far beneath his 
dignity, and all these could have been only messenger* 
crying each in its own alarming way, "Prepare to meet 
thy God, for lo, he that formeth the mountains, and cre- 
ate th the wind," will in person " declare unto man what 
is his thought." God hath not done thus ; but he hath 
consulted our peace by addressing us by men like our- 
selves, all whose language is, " Come, my people, enter 
thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee : 
hide thyself as it v/ere for a little moment, until the in- 
dignation be overpast. For, behold, the Lord cometli 
out of his place to punish the inhabitants of the earth 
for their iniquity ; the earth also shall disclose her 
blood, and no more cover her slain." This tender re- 
gard to the best interests of mankind ; this pity to the 
wretched, pardon to the guilty, relief to the oppressed, 
patience with the wicked, and protection of the good, 
this lenity flows through all the Christian religion like 
the gentle river that watered the garden of Eden, and 
not confined to paradise, parted itself, and ran dis- 
tributing its benefits in tea thousand diilererit slreanis 
among all sorts of men. 

In this manner let us consider the whole Christian re- 
ligion as full of motives to credibility, or reasons to be 
believed, and, let us not deceive ourselves, we are bound 
to examine and admit the claim. Divide ail relio-ion 
into the two parts of lav/ and Gospel, duty and mercy. 
If you attend to the law, it is a bill brought in by the 
Lord against his tenant : can the tenant refuse to exam- 
ine it? Consider the Gospel in the light of a generous 
discharge : can the wretched bankrupt refuse to exam- 
ine such a receipt ? It is the excellence of the Gospel 
that it preserves its features, say what it will ; and each 
part taken separately, as well as the whole taken to- 
gether, is an irresistible claim of credit. For example, 
take the character of Christ as a teacher sent from God, 
or take his resurrection from the dead, which was one 
only out of many of his works ; examine either of these. 



280 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

and you will find all the characters of religious truth, 
for each is plain, clear, kind, just, and full of majesty ; 
and to deny these is to admit the opposite, which is full 
of all impiety and iniquity. The pretended religion of 
the world is a sepulchre " full of dead men's bones, and 
of all uncleanness :" the religion of Christianity is like 
the temple of God, " adorned with goodly stones and 
gifts, where the Lord commands the blessing, even life 
for evermore." One chief excellence of this religion 
is, that each part supports its truth in our understand- 
ings by proofs, which support the whole ; so that if a 
man admits either of the truths just now mentioned, he 
must for the same reasons admit the whole ; and for this 
reason we pronounce the weak believer, who admits on- 
ly one truth, in a state as safe as that in which the 
strong believer is. Before a man can admit one truth, 
he must put off many prejudices, and love of truth must 
reign in his heart : now where love of truth prevails 
over prejudice, the mind is prepared to admit all truths 
on conviction that the}'- are so. O that Christians would 
enter into these sentiments, so just to God, and so friend- 
ly to man ! O that they would " open the gates" of 
their churches, " that the righteous nation which keep- 
eth the truth may enter in !" Instead of this, we make 
out human articles of faith, call him a strong believer 
who credits the whole, him a weak one who doubts the 
whole, and him an infidel who questions a part ; we 
possess ourselves of the door way, and, though the ben- 
ches within are empty, and though the voice from above 
cries, " Compel the halt and the maimed to come in, for 
yet there is room," somehow or other in our hurry we 
mistake the voice, and set a brother, the most gigantic 
and grim we can find, to keep the door and compel 
them to keep out? Ye blind, and halt, and maimed, ye 
limping followers of the physician and friend of sin . 
ners ! do not take the character of your friend from that 
of these men. Indeed he was not like them ; he was quite 
another man ; he was not like better servants than thpy, 
he was far better than the best of his followers ; further 
above them than they are above the worst of maukind. 
" What manner of men" were the apostles ? '•• Eagb on€ 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 281 

resembled. the child of a king." What noble sentiments J 
What a princely way of thinking in religion had they ! 
What iiinumerable exercises of " wisdom and under- 
standing, and largeness of heart, exceeding much, even 
as the sand that is on the sea shore !" But what was 
all their generosity but as a " drop of a bucket" com- 
pared with the " rivers of pleasures," the " fulness of 
joys," which flow, through the mediation of Jesus Christ, 
" at God's right hand for evermore !" 

A believer, then, is one, who is convinced in his own 
mind, of the truth, the whole truth, or a part of the 
truth of the Christian religion ; and this conviction in 
him is an effect produced by those characters of truth, 
which distinguish all truth from falsehood, and particu- 
larly the truths of religion from the mistakes of sin. 
Now let us apply this notion of faith to the text. Be- 
lief worketh: belief of any thing worketh : belief of a 
part of Christianity worketh a partial conformity to 
Christianity : and belief of the whole worketh univer- 
sal obedience : belief of a painful truth worketh fear : 
belief of a distant good worketh desire : and belief of 
the great love of God to us worketh love to him, and to 
ail his creatures. If I had a mind to lull your souls in- 
to a iatal security, I would endeavour to persuade you 
that you might have faith without feeling any effects, 
or bringing forth any fruits for many years : but who 
can imagine that a belief of truths such as those of the 
Gospel can lie dead in the heart? To say nothing of 
virtue, even our vicious passions would rouse such a 
disagreeable stranger into action. To those who be- 
lieve the testimony of Scripture, the proof is at hand, 
for thus the oracle of Goddeclares, '' Faith, if it hath 
not works, is dead ;" and again, '• Wilt thou know, O 
vain man, that faith without works is dead ;" and again, 
•• As the l3ody without the spirit is dead, so faith with- 
out worlis is dead also." Were it possible for a man to 
comply with the apostle's requisition, and " shew his 
faith without his works," and some men can do this by 
producing a creed in writing, what then should such a 
man do ? He would prove that he was a dead man. It 
would be as if a dead carcase would come forth out of a 

QJJi. 



S82 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

grave, stand up, and prove by its putrefaction that it 
had been dead and buried forty years. No, you may be 
prejudiced in favour of religion, and take things as you 
iind them : but it is impossible you should admit the 
proofs of a truth without feeling- effects. " Faith is the 
substance of things hoped for ;" it substantiates '' things 
not seen," brings distant objects near, and makes them 
stand true in the mind, just as the object we look at is 
in the eye, the form we love ever in the memory, where 
recollection clothes it, and fancy gives it a thousand 
charms. It is extremely difficult to assort faith and feel- 
ings, because we have been brought up in the midst of 
the truths of religion, and our belief, and pleasures, and 
pains, have interwoven themselves, one with another : 
but these effects of believing are not the less real, nor 
the less connected with exercises of believing, for our 
not making the distinction. 

I will explain myself by a supposed case. Imagine 
our Lord preaching at Jerusalem, and one of the inhab- 
itants coming into the assembly just as he was uttering 
the three parts of the twenty fifth chapter of Matthew. 
The .first is the parable of the ten virgins, the second 
is that of the talents, and the third is an explanation of 
the other parts in a description of the day of judgment. 
Let us suppose our hearers to have lived till then in ig- 
norance and sin, and now for the first time attending to 
the truth of one part of religion, the righteous judg- 
ment of the world at the last day. Let us suppose him 
convinced of the nature, necessity, and equity of a day 
of judgment. How would this man return home, think 
ye, and what would his condition be, while his instructer 
was gone out of town? Would he not say to himse'f, 
'^ I am one of the foolish virgins ; I am that wicked and 
slothful servant, who hid his Lord's talent in the earth ; 
I have seen my fellow creatures hungry and thirsty, and 
naked and sick, and have not ministered unto them ; I de- 
.serve, in a state of just distribution of pleasure and pain, 
to be denied happiness, and plunged into misery : I fear 
this state, and I have reason to fear it; love of justice 
will oblige the judge tQ punish me ; yes, he must set 
ihe sheep, my good father, and my pious mother, and 



PAITH AKD HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 283' 

ali like them on his right hand, while I and my wicked 
companions must stand confounded en the left: O I 
think the day is come, and I hear the Judge saying, 
Cast the unprofitable servant into outer darkness. O my 
God ! what shall I do ?" " Whither shall I go from thy 
Spirit ? or whither shall I flee from thy presence ? If 
I ascend up into heaven, thou art there. If I make my 
bed in the grave, behold thou art there. If I say. Sure- 
ly the darkness shall cover me ; even the night shall 
be light about me. Yea, the darkness and the light are 
both alike to thee. Hell and destruction are naked be- 
fore the Lord ; how much more then the hearts of the 
children of men !" The faith of this man is a belief of 
the day of judgment, and it works by fear of punish- 
ment, like that of Noah, who " being warned of God 
of things not seen as 3'et," was " moved with fear," and 
"prepared an ark to the saving of his house." What 
was this patriarch afraid of? He was moved with the 
fear of being drowned. Why moved with the fear of 
being drowned, but because he believed the testimony 
of God, who warned him of the flood before it came, 
and of his danger on account of it? Suppose this man 
to attend to a second discourse of Jesus Christ on the 
subject of forgiveness, and to hear him utter the para- 
bles contained in the fifteenth of Luke, that of the lost 
sheep, the lost silver, and the lost son, which he ad- 
dressed to " publicans and sinners;" suppose him to be- 
lieve the truth of forgiveness ; is it not clear, that he 
would return home full of this delightful subject, '' Joy 
shall be in heaven over one sinner that repenteth ?" 
Faith in the truth of the report of God's parental love, 
expressed in finding and forgiving his lost children, 
would work by love, gratitude, obedience, caution, and 
perpetual hatred of sin. 

Most of the truths of religion are of a mixed kind, 
and therefore they produce various effects. One exam- 
ple shall serve : there were in the Corinthian church 
several disorders, which the apostle Paul thought fit to 
reprove sharply in his first Epistle. A man of his gen- 
erous kind never uses reproof by choice, and the neces- 
sity thai compels him to it, gives him pain. Good man 



284 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

that he was ! His '' flesh had no rest," he was " trou- 
bled on every side, without were lightings, within were 
fears." He even •*• repented," that he had '' made them 
sorry with a letter," for it was " in his heart to live and 
die with them," well knowing that a Christian church, 
with all its disorders, is a more desirable abode than a 
" blaspheming" synagogue, or a magnificent temple fill- 
ed with " craftsmen" trading in the glory of the great 
goddess Diana. In this condition Titus found him, and 
informed him, that the Corinthians had been extremely 
unhappy that they had given him occasion to censure 
their conduct; but that they had been convinced of the 
justice and friendship of the reproof, and entertained 
the most fervent love for their kind reprover. This 
filled our apostle with great satisfaction : he wrote a 
second Epistle, and gave a most beautiful description of 
the fruits of godly sorrow. " What a carefulness it 
wrought in you; yea, what clearing of yourselves, yea, 
what indignation, yea, what fear, yea, what vehement 
desire, yea, what zeal, yea, what revenge : in all things 
ye have approved yourselves to be clear in this matter." 
All truths made up of justice and mercy, the rights of 
the law and the grace of the Gospel, because they are 
mixed in themselves, will necessarily produce various 
emotions in us. Some will be painful, some will be 
pleasant ; but all together will constitute that body of 
Christian virtues called the nsw man^ which consists of 
" kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffer- 
ing, forgiveness, charity," and ''' which after God is cre- 
ated in righteousness and true holiness." 

On these principles our apostle affirms in the text 
" faith worketh," and, as the immediate work before 
the Galatians, to which the apostle exhorted them, was 
a work of love, it was highly proper to affirm, "faith 
worketh by love." Let us finish by observing, that 
there is a close connexion between the Christian reli- 
gion and faith, faith and love, love and good works ; and 
let us apply this observation to the case of the church 
at Galatia, and in that to our own. 

There is a close connexion between the Christian re- 
ligion and faith ; that is to say, Christianity is fitted to 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 2&S 

obtain belief, and does actually produce it, as an instru- 
ment in the hand of the great " master of assemblies," 
whose " words are wise, acceptable words, even words 
of truth," and therefore " as goads," and " as nails fas- 
tened in a sure place." Take the whole of our holy 
religion together, and it deserves to be called as it is, 
simply love. Often, very often, the whole is called 
love. What is God as he is described in this religion ? 
" God is love." On what principle did he act when he 
designed the Christian religion ? " God loved the 
world." What is Jesus Christ? " The gift of God, the 
unspeakable ^ft of God." What is the whole part of 
Jesus Christ in this religion, his doctrine, his death, his 
Spirit, his precepts ? It is a " love that passeth know- 
ledge." How doth the Gospel of Christ work upon the 
minds and hearts of men ? It draws them with " cords 
of a man, with bands of love." It resembles the love of 
a parent to a little child, "teaching him to go, taking 
him by his arms," though he " knows not" the soft hand 
that supports him. W^hat is the short history of reveal- 
ed religion in the heart and life of man ? The author 
tells us, "I have loved thee with an everlasting love, 
therefore with loving kindness have I drawn thee." 
What we affirm is, that this religion of unutterable love 
is very credible, more than likely to be true. Is it 
incredible that God should love ? What can be more 
worthy of belief than this ? Is it improbable that he 
should love man, the creature in the world made in his 
own image, when his tender mercies are over all his 
v/orks ? Let us reason on the subject of Divine love 
as the Psalmist reasoned on that of Divine knowledge : 
" He that planted the ear, shall he not hear? He that' 
teacheth man knowledge, shall not he know ?" In like 
manner we ask, he that formed the hearts of those good 
parents, Jacob and David, will he " forget .to be gra- 
cious?" He that put irresistible eloquence into the 
tears of an outcast babe in a flag basket, so that a stran- 
ger " had compassion on him, and" disinterestedly " said, 
Go call a nurse, his name shall be Moses, I drew him 
out of the water ;" will he who compels us by our own 
feelings to be kind, " in anger shut up his own tender 



2B6 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE LNSEP ARABLE. 

mercies ?" Hear how the God of the whole earth con- 
descends to answer our questions : "* Like as a father pit- 
ieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that leai- 
him. Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she 
should not have compassion on the son of her womb? 
Yea, they may forj^fot, yet will I not forget thee.'' Such 
speculations as those were all to be collected from the 
world of nature before Christ came, but if to these we 
add what the Scripture calls the *• acts,'- the ^^ mighty 
acts"' of the Lord, how many blind eyes he hath open- 
ed, how many hard hearts he hath softened, how many 
crimes he hath forgiven, how many disconsolate and 
wretched peopio he hath made happy by the iife, death, 
and resurrection of his Son, we shall conclude, that 
•• the Lord is gracious and lull of compassion, slow to 
anger, and cf great mercy, great, and greatly to be 
praised, and his greatness unsearchable." No, great 
God I we are not intidels. We will not otfend thy good- 
ness by denying light at noonday-. Behold, the tears 
that trickle down the cheeks of this assembly, sa}', -^ He 
brought me up" also "'• out of a horrible pit, out of the 
miry clay, and set my feet upon a rock, and established 
my goings, and put a nev*^ song in my mouth, even 
praise unio our God. Many, O Lord, my God, are thy 
wonderful works which thou hast done, and thy thoughts 
which are to us ward : they cannot be reckoned up in 
order unto thee: if 1 would speak of them they are 
more than can be numbered. Whom have I in heaven 
bat thee ; and there is none upon earth that 1 desire 
beside thee !" 

Thus "'wisdom hath builded her house, furnished her 
table." and "sent forth her maidens crying. Forsake the 
foolish and live, and go in the Vr-ny of understanding; I 
will speak of excellent things, my mouth shall speak 
truth, all plain to him that undcrstandeth, and right to 
him that findeth knowledge." But wherein lies the 
excellency of wisdom, and what gives it advantage over 
folly? It hath advantages in every respect: but one of 
the chief is, that it necessarily produces happiness by 
means of holiness, so that you may safely conclude, as 
religion is fitted to produce faith, so faith is fitted to 



FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 287 

produce love, and love good works ; for this is an end 
worthy of the means, and does honour to God the first 
cause. Is it conceivable that when such a religion as 
this gets into the mind, it should skulk like a reptile, 
and lurk beneath the shade of some poisonous weed, the 
fruit of the curse ? Doth it not rather enter like a judge 
into a court to " sit chief," and dwell there like a " king 
in an army ?" Who shall answer these questions ? Let 
those who have best understood religion, and exercised 
most faith on the truths of it. See, what a " great cloud 
of witnesses compasseth yon about. Christians ! Read 
at your leisure the eleventh chapter of Hebrews, and 
observe the men and women, " of whom the world was 
not worthy, who through faith subdued kingdoms, 
wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the 
mouths of lions ;" who " had trial of cruel mockings 
and scourgings, yea, of bonds and imprisonment ;" who 
" wandered about in sheep skins and goat skins, being 
destitute, afflicted, tormented ;" and who preferred nil 
these before the "pleasures of sin," and esteemed even 
" the reproach of Christ greater riches than the trea- 
sures of the world." Faith and obedience then are in- 
separable, and as these men cheerfully obeyed their or- 
ders, because they believed the facts, which made their 
obedience necessary ; so Christians obey the orders in 
the New Testament given them, because they believe 
the facts, which the New Testament reports for true. 
It would be easy to show you that faith in the Christian 
religion is closely connnected with love, and necessari- 
ly produces it : but this I think not needful now, for 
who doth not know that belief of such a God as Chris- 
tianity describes, compels believers to love God and 
adore him ? And who doth not know that if a man say, 
"1 love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar: for 
he that loveth not his brother, whom he hath seen, how 
can he love God whom he bath not seen ?" The apostle 
doth not mean by "brother" one of our own partj^, jior 
a believer of any other party: but one of our own class 
of creatures, a brother man. In my opinion there is no 
danger of heresy or sin in saying, If I love God, I shall 
love my brother Christian, my brother Jew^ my brother 



288 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

negro. " Have we not all one Father ? Hath not one 
God created us ? Why do we deal treacherously every 
man against his brother?" What if Judah hath " pro- 
faned the holiness of the Lord, which he ought to have 
loved ;" what if the miserable heathens have " married 
the daughter of a strange god," and '•'• for this cause are 
given up unto vile affections ;" is it for us to deal in 
thunder and lightning, to " deck ourselves with majes- 
ty, and cast abroad the rage of our wrath ?" Let us 
know our religion better, and let us always remember, 
that " in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any 
thing, nor uncircumcision, but faith which worketh by 
love." 

This notion of religion was highly proper to answer 
the end for which our apostle wrote it. You read in 
the fifteenth of Acts, that some Jews, who had become 
Christians, but had not well understood either their own 
religion or that of Jesus Christ, endeavoured rather to 
reform the Jewish religion than to abolish it wholly in 
favour of Christianity. They approved of the pious 
principles of Christians; but they were for retaining 
them under the forms of Jewish ceremonies. These 
men were a great trouble to the churches, so great that 
our apostle wished, for the good of society, they had been 
" cut off." They began by pressing the necessity of 
circumcision ; but this was only to pave the way for all 
the other ceremonies of Moses, for the " weak and beg- 
garly elements of days, and months, and times, and 
years." This Epistle was written directly against this 
class of men, who had been at Galatia, and had " be- 
witched the foolish Galatians." Good, simple souls, 
they had been heathens, and had received the Gospel 
in transports, so that "if it had been possible, they 
would have plucked out their own eyes, and have given 
them" to their teacher. Such converts are very apt to 
be prejudiced in favour of any thing that has the ap- 
pearance of piety, for they are not aware of the spirit 
and tendency of such alterations. Our apostle destroys 
the four great arguments used by these Jewish teachers. 
The first is an argument of authority : Peter, and 
James, and the whole church at Jerusalem were cir- 



"FAITH AfID HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 289 

cumcisecl. Very well, says our apostle, I am not a dep- 
uty from them ; I had an " immediate revelation" as 
well as they, and when I told them, I was sent to the 
Gentiles, " they g-ave to me and Barnabas the right 
hands of fellowship, that we should go unto the heathen, 
and they unto the circumcision." But, they said, Paul 
had changed his opinion, and had circumcised Timothy ; 
But, replies our apostle, Titus, a Greek, also Avas with 
me, and he was " not compelled to be circumcised ;" 
and " I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do 
I yet suffer persecution ?" They added. The promises 
were made to Abraham and his seed: True, said the 
apostle, but you have mistaken the word, " he saitli 
not. And to seeds as of many, but as of one, And to thy 
seed, which is Christ ;" the promises were made to Abra- 
ham, and to one of his posterity, not to all his descend- 
ants, and that son of Abraham is Christ ; it is in him, 
and not in your teachers of circumcision, that " all na- 
tions shall be blessed." Their fourth argument was ta- 
ken from the Prophecy of Isaiah, that children should 
be born from among the heathen to Jerusalem : Another 
mistake, says our apostle ; the prophet doth not speak 
of the Jewish Jerusalem, but of the ancient Jerusalem, 
in the hands of the Jebusites, " Jerusalem, which is 
above, is free, which is the mother of us all." Weary 
with these trifling arguments, destructive of the genius 
and spirit of the Christian religion, the apostle observes 
in the text, that in the religion of " Jesus Christ, nei- 
ther circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcis- 
ion, but faith which worketh by love :" as if he had 
said, I preach to you a revealed religion of truth and 
love : do not tell me of authority, I respect Peter, but 
Peter was blamed, and what authority is equal to that 
of Christ, under which I act ? " When it pleased God 
to reveal his Son in me, I conferred not with flesh and 
blood." Do not plead my example, and from an occa- 
sional action of mine, infer a general rule of conduct to 
bind all people in different circumstances. You quote 
Scripture : read it again, the text is right, but your ex- 
position is wrong : you have not understood the Scrip- 
tures ; it is impossible to pervert them so as to banish 
25 



290 FAITH AND HOLINESS ARE INSEPARABLE. 

love from religion, to make room for dry ceremonies, 
party zeal, and false teachers, who " constrain you to be 
circumcised, only lest they should suifer persecution for 
the cross of Christ," who sacrifice truth, virtue, and 
the happiness of a whole world to their own servile 
fear of man and worldly interest. Christians, apply 
these truths to yourselves, as far as circumstances re- 
quire, and remember that no authority, no examples, no 
not those of inspired apostles, no texts of Scripture 
about Abraham and Jerusalem, ought to prevail for a 
moment to darken a religion of truth, and faith, and uni- 
versal love. " Though we, or an angel from heaven, 
preach any other Gospel unto you, let him be accursed. 
In Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, 
nor imcircumcision, but a new creature : and as many 
as walk according to this rule, peace be on them and 
mercy, and upon the Israel of God !" God grant us this 
grace ! To him be honour and glory forever. Amen. 



DISCOURSE XV. 

INCORRIGIBLE SI^"NERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE AT THE 
LAST DAY. 

[AT FOXOJV.] 



MATTHEW XXii, 12. 

And he ■was speechless. 

Under the similitude of an entertainment given by a 
king- to his subjects on the marriage of his son, our 
Lord sets forth the blessings of the Gospel, and, in the 
text, that degree of guilt beyond excuse, under which 
they who perish in Gospel times must lie. It is in this 
view that we are going to consider the text : but before 
we come immediately to the subject, we will make one 
remark on the context, and one on the manner of ex- 
pounding parables. 

In this and the foregoing chapter there are three par- 
ables, which contain the history of three periods of 
time. That of the '•'■ householder," who " let out a vine- 
yard to husbandmen," is a true history of the Jews from 
the time of Moses to forty years after the death of 
Christ ; all that time was employed either in cultiva- 
ting and adorning the country, enjoying the produce of 
it, hearing and disobeying the prophets, crucifying 
Christ, or in suffering an entire destruction for that and 
for all other crimes. In the days of Joshua, David, Solo- 
mon, and such princes, they were " hedging in" the vine- 
yard, '^ digging" wine-presses, " building" towers, and 



292 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCtSfi 

SO on. When the prophets came, they were " killing" 
one, and " stoning" another. When Christ the Son 
came, they " slew" him. When the Jews were driven 
out of their country by the Romans, and the land left to 
Other inhabitants, the Lord was '' destroying these wick- 
ed men,"^ and '' letting out his vineyard to others." 
The second parable of the maja who had " two sons," 
Avhom he ordered to go work in his vineyard, is a his- 
tory of the time of John the baptist. The third para- 
ble of the marriage of the king's son, out of which we 
have taken the text, is a history of the times of the Gos 
pel from its being first preached by Jesus Christ to the 
Jews, to the time of his second coming to judge the 
world. In this plain and comprehensive manner did 
Jftsus Christ draw great events into a narrow point of 
T*icw, omitting the fate of empires to lay before us the 
destiny of religion, in which we are more interested 
than in that of learning, or commerce, or any thing else 
In the world. 

Our Lord usually taught by parables ; that is, by con- 
tinued similitudes or likenesses, and the best rule for 
Interpreting a parable is not to interpret it too much, if 
I may speak so, but to take the general likeness, or one 
doctrine from the chief figures. A parable is a kind of 
histoiy-painting, and should we see a picture of Abra- 
ham offering up Isaac, we should trifle, and receive no 
instruction, were we to fix our attention on the " thick- 
et behind," the order of the w^ood, the knife, and so on, 
for the picture was not drawn for the sake of represent- 
ing these things, s© much as the principal object, which 
was, the patriarch in an exercise of the noblest confi- 
dence in God, in earnest to slay his son at the command 
of God, and " accounting that God was able to raise him 
up even from the dead," though there had never then 
been in the world an example of one rising from the 
dead. Thus in parables, if I could allow myself wil- 
lingly to teach you to trifle with the Scriptures, and to 
think yourself wiser than others for knowing better 
than they how to play the fool, I would show you the 
conformities between God and a " king," " a certain" 
king, for we must not lose a word, Christ and a " son," 



AT THE LAST DAY. 29^3 

conversion and a " wedding," preaching the Gospel and 
" bidding" to a marriage. I might tell you the likeness 
of ^' oxen and fatlings" to the doctrines of the Gospel ; 
of the " wedding garment" to the righteousness of 
Christ;, and thus we might go through all the parable, 
and crumble it into as many doctrinesi as there are words 
in the twelve verses. Having done this, I might com- 
pare the parable in Matthew with the same parable in 
Luke, and reconcile seeming contradictions. I might 
show you that if Matthew calls the feast a " dinner," it 
was because the Gospel was preached in the middle age 
of the world, and if Luke calls it a "• supper," it is be- 
cause the Gospel is preached in the last ages of the 
world. This is what I meant just now by interpreting 
too much ; for by making every thing out of a parable, 
we teach the parable to say nothing. It is evident, by 
this parable our Lord chiefly intends to show the levity 
with which the Jews treated the Gospel, and conse- 
quently the justice as well as the goodness of God in 
sending it to the Gentiles. The first " would not come :" 
the last furnished the table " with guests both bad and 
good ;" but, that we might thoroughly understand the 
purity of Christianity, he informs us that bad Gentiles 
as well as wicked Jews would be inexcusable, if they 
" turned the grace of God into lasciviousness." This 
is the sense of the text, ''And he was speechless." 

However bold men may be in denying, or however 
ingenious they may be in deceiving themselves by 
keeping the subject out of sight, certain it is the text 
speaks of a very serious and sad event, which must 
come to pass, and to which we are hastening as fast as 
time can carry us. How rapid is life ! How far are 
some of you down a stream', which none of you can stop ; 
a little longer and you will be lost in the ocean, and 
heard of no more till the sea shall "give up the dead.' 
Then, should you be found "speechless," we should 
forget all your pleasant days of prosperity in this life, 
and one thing would strike us dumb with astonishment : 
there he stands : stands before his judge : and stands ex- 
actly as the Gospel foretold : " speechless !" How 
comes it to pass that a subject so true and so terrible is 



294 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS ^VTLL BE WITHOUT EXCtJSE 

SO little attended to ? Is it ignorance ? How is that 
possible ? Are you not here present ? Am I not stand- 
ing here before you with the Gospel in my hand ? Have 
I not read the parable distinctly ? Is not this the clear 
meaning of our prophet and judge ? Let us leave that 
excuse to the heathens ; it is impossible for us to make 
it. What is the cause ? . . . To whom am I speaking ? 
Not one of us intends to be the man of the text. Each 
goes to-day to his " farm," to-morrow to his " merchan- 
dize," and each intends some future day to put on the 
" wedding garment." The king hath a wardrobe for 
the accommodation of his guests, and I shall be ready in 
an instant when I receive notice of his approach. Ah ! 
this is the cause of your present unpreparedness to die ; 
and if the man in the world who hates you most, and 
most heartily wishes for your destruction, were to give 
you advice, he could give you none so likely to glut his 
malice as this, which you both give and take yourself. 
Do you mean to say, " Let that which should have been 
for my welfare become a trap ? Let my days be few, 
and let my prayer become sin !" This is the language 
of an enemy. Let us not be such enemies to ourselves. 
The voice of friendship says, " O come let us kneel be- 
fore the Lord our maker ! To-day if ye will hear his 
voice, harden not your hearts : lest he swear in his 
wrath. You shall not enter into my rest." 

It may happen, that a man apprized of danger may 
not know how to escape it, and lest any of you should 
be through my negligence in such a state, I will endeav- 
our to show you what is necessary to avoid the shame 
mentioned in the text. It may also happen, that a man, 
who is apprized of his danger, and hath a general no- 
tion of a method of escaping it, may loiter away his 
time, and trifle a day too long. In friendship for such, I 
shall endeavour to convince them that they are, and 
v/ill forever be, inexcusable for doing so. Avail your- 
selves of these precious moments, and all the while I 
am speaking, remember a saying of Paul, " God limit- 
eth a certain day, saying. To-day hear his voice. Are 
not your days like the days of an hireling ?" Can you 
lengthen your day a single moment, and have you any 



AT THE LAST DAY. 295 

choice what year or what day to die, and have you any 
security that this is not the day, and this the hour ? 
'• God limiteth a certain day." " This is your day, 
hear his voice." 

Lest any one should be ignorant of the way of escap- 
ing the misery mentioned in the text, we must inquire, 
w^hat the way of escape is. I do not know what the 
" wedding garment" is. I do know that princes and 
great men kept wardrobes to accommodate their guests, 
and I could name one Roman, who had five thousand 
habits in keeping for that purpose ; but we are no nearer 
to our Lord's meaning for knowing this ; for, you see, I 
think parables are not understood by being taken to 
pieces, but by being put together. The thing speaks 
for itself; the "wedding garment" is that which is ne- 
cessary to salvation, and whatever is necessary to salva- 
tion is the " wedding garment." 

We need not waste time in proving, first, that a man 
living and dying in the practice of sin is expressly ex- 
cluded from the kingdom of God. '• Know you not that 
the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God ? 
Be not deceived : neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor 
adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves 
with mankind, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor drunkards, 
nor reviiers, nor extortioners, shall inherit the kingdom 
of God." It is not only on the testimony of Paul that 
we affirm, such people cannot be saved; reason and the 
nature of things lead us to the same conclusion. For 
example, a drunkard wishes to avoid pain ; the pain of 
ivhat ? The pain of being sober, and the more intoler- 
able pain of thinking and reflecting, which sobriety 
would bring on: He wishes to be happy ; but what is 
his happiness '? It is to gratify his senses, to drown his 
reason, to sink himself into the condition of a brute. 
Admit only that a future state is not a state of sensual 
gratification ; but that it is a condition of reflection and 
thought, and it is easy to determine that the bare 
living in such a state would be a cruel punishment to 
this sort of men. Yes, if there was no "unquenchable 
fire," no " great wine-press of the wrath of God," no 
" outer darkness," no " devil and his angels," a bare ne- 



296 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 

cessity of thinking without a possibility of stupifying 
thought by subjecting the soul to the senses, that would 
be a great misery to such men. "The unrighteous 
shall not inherit the kingdom of God." A life of sin is 
therefore " the broad way that leadeth to destruction," 
and the direction of that way, like that of every other 
road, is not altered because " many go therein :" it will 
lead the whole, and it will lead each individual, to the 
very same spot. The observation of our Lord, that 
" many" go in this road, is a strong reason to dissuade 
us from going in it ; for what kind of men are they ? 
If any man could bring himself to live with such men as 
bloody Cain, cruel Pharaoh, intoxicated Nabal, cove- 
tous Judas, with liars and thieves, and blasphemers, 
could he also prevail with himself to call such monsters 
about him when he finds himself djing, and can he 
choose such for his companions in a future state, where, 
without any mixture of sober and decent men, all are 
the refuse of the world ; " reprobate silver shall men 
call them because the Lord hath rejected them ?" This 
class of men certainly have not on the " wedding gar- 
ment." 

There is a second class called by our Lord " unprofit- 
able servants." These useless people, serving none of 
the purposes of religion, are, however, generally found, 
if not in the church, yet not in company with the profli- 
gate part of mankind. A thousand causes, none of them 
religious, produce the decency of this sort of people. 
Birth and education, constitution and connexion, neces- 
sity of character, and love of gain, smart for first trials 
and fear of future consequences, and man}^ such things, 
are sufficient to produce a worldly decency of living. 
This class, therefore, are not so bad as the former, who 
have broke through all these considerations ; but as 
they do not act from principles of religion, they certain- 
ly have no right to the rewards of it. " There was a 
law in Rome, that those who in a storm foi'sook the 
ship should forfeit all proper!}^ therein ; and the ship 
and lading should belong entirely to those who staid in 
it. In a dangerous tempest all the mariners forsook the 
ship, except only one sick passenger, who by reason of 



AT THE LAST DA\''. 297 

his disease was unable to get out and escape. So it hap- 
pened the ship came safe to port. The sick man kept 
possession, and claimed the benefit of the law ; but it 
was agreed that the sick man was not within the reason 
of the law, for the reason of making it, was to give en- 
couragement to such as should venture their lives to 
save the vessel; but this was a merit, which he could 
never pretend to, who neither staid in the ship upon 
that account, nor contributed any thing to its preserva- 
tion." "Unprofitable servants" are in the condition of 
this man, and they can claim nothing under Christianity 
as a law, because they never acted on the reasons of it 
They stand on the same ground as heathens do, with 
this difference : heathens, like the sick man, were inca- 
pable of embracing the Gospel, through a necessity of 
condition; but these, living under the Gospel, wilfully 
put themselves into the condition of heathens, without 
any necessity, and against the most pressing remonstran- 
ces to act otherwise. Far from disgracing the " wed- 
ding garment" by pretending that such men wear it, 
the very pretence is an aggravation of their crimes ; 
and when the Judge says of one of these, " Cast that 
slothful, unprofitable," and therefore " wicked servant, 
into outer darkness, he" will be ''speechless." 

If the "wedding garment" be that, without which a 
man cannot be saved, we must examine what that is, and 
the Scriptures will readily inform us. It is " holiness, 
without which no man shall see the Lord :" it is " faith, 
without which it is impossible to please God :" it is re- 
pentance, for "except ye repent, ye shall all perish :" 
it is perseverance, for he only "that endureth to the 
end shall be saved :" it is " feeding" the " hungry," and 
" clothing" the " naked," for to these " shall the King 
say. Come, ye blessed :" it is to be a true and real 
Christian. There are different degrees of Christianity, 
as there are different sizes and shapes among men ; but 
all are alike in kind. " Little children" in religion 
"know the Father: young men are strong, the word 
of God abideth in them, and they have overcome the 
wicked one :" and " fathers have known God from 
the beginning." All these differ from one another m 



298 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 

degree ; but they all differ in kind from other men, who 
" are in darkness, walk in darkness," and " know not 
whither tbey go, because" ignorance ''hath blinded their 
eyes." The " wedding garment" of a little child dif- 
fers in excellence from that of a father; but it hath an 
excellence in its kind. Let this guide our present in- 
quiry, and let us fix not on any degree of religion, but on 
the sort of religion, which distinguisheth a Christian 
from all other men, and which at the same time pro- 
vides for very great distinctions between Christians 
themselves. 

I can think of nothing more likely to direct us pro- 
perly than this expression of our Lord, " Except a man 
be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God." Not 
to detain you with a list of interpretations, but to come 
directly to the point, Ltake the new birth to mean three 
changes, or, to speak more properly, one change, which 
it is most easy to consider under three different views ; 
a change of ideas : a change of tempers : and a change 
of actions : the first is the Christian religion in the mind ;- 
the second is the same religion in the heart ; and the 
third is still the same religion in the life and conversa- 
tion. This is a real alteration, which the Christian re- 
ligion makes in every true disciple of the Son of God, 
and the alteration is so great that it may with the ut- 
most propriety be likened to a being " born again." 
Let us examine ourselves upon these articles. 

By ideas I mean thoughts. By Christian ideas I mean 
the thoughts of Jesus Christ on articles of religion, as 
on God, and the worship of him ; on man, and his con- 
dition ; on sin, its cause and consequences ; on a future 
state of rewards and punishments ; on himself, and his 
office as mediator; and so on. You will readily allow, 
that Jesus Christ perfectly understood these subjects, 
and thought of them very differently from all bad men 
of every description in the world. When I say the 
thoughts of Jesus Christ must become ours, I suppose 
him to have not carried back his secret thoughts to 
heaven, but to have left his true and real sentiments in 
the Holy Scriptures ; some clearly expressed in words, 
and others in actions. Now if a man takes his thouo^ht§ 



AT THE LAST DAY. 299 

of these subjects from the Scriptures, he is in possess- 
ion of the ideas of Jesus Christ. Like him, he thinks 
there is one God, who loved the world so as to give his 
Son, and so on. This is one view of the Christian reli- 
gion : it makes a body of sound thinking in the under- . 
standing of a good man; and he, not having thought of 
these subjects in such a manner before, is said to be 
" born again." Every thing in religion takes a new 
form, and the Christian seems to see with new eyes. 
Lay it down then for a certain rule, that knowledge of 
the Christian religion, and a persuasion that it is true, is 
necessary to entering into the kingdom of God. 

By temper^ I mean the frame of the heart, the condi- 
tion of all those movements in us which are attended 
with pleasure or pain, such as desire, fear, hope, anger, 
and so on. You will readily allow that all these dispo- 
sitions were in a state of the highest perfection in Je- 
sus Christ ; and you will as readily agree they are not 
so in other men. Now if we learn of Jesus Christ to 
be mild and lowly, and so on, we are altered from the 
temper of bad men, and from the frame of our own 
hearts, before we had the honour of admiring the char- 
.acter of Christ. These dispositions of the heart are un- 
der the government of our ideas or notions of things. 
If we think the world man's chief good, we shall chief- 
ly desire and pursue the world ; if on the contrary, we 
are convinced, by the instructions of Jesus Christ, that 
the world is vanity, that sin is the greatest evil, and God 
the chief good of man, we shall desire and love, hope 
and fear, and act accordingly. These tempers are ne- 
cessary to the practice of religion here, and to the en- 
joyment of God hereafter. Without these, therefore, a 
man " cannot enter into the kingdom of God." 

By Christian actions^ I mean such a course of life as 
Jesus Christ pursued, which was made up of single ac- 
tions of piety, justice, and temperance, connected to- 
gether, and following one another in constant succes- 
sion. Such a life cannot be described better than it is 
by the apostle Paul ; " Whatsoever things are true, 
whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are 
just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are 



300 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCtlSE 

lovely, whatsoever things are of good report ; if there 
be any virtue, and if there be any praise, think on these 
things :" for " these things ye have both learned and re- 
ceived, and heard, and seen in me." A man, who knows, 
and loves, and lives the Gospel, will be saved ; he is " born 
again," and hath on " the wedding garment :" but the 
man destitute of knowledge, love, and obedience is ex- 
cluded both by the sentence of Jesus Christ, and by a 
necessity of condition ; for, were it possible to reverse 
the sentence, he is not in a condition capable of being 
made happy by the Gospel, he cannot " enter into the 
kingdom of God," he cannot " see the kingdom of God." 
If any one in this assembly be found at last in such a 
condition, he will be " speechless." This is the express 
testimony of Jesus Christ in the text. The man in the 
parable was not awed into silence by the dreadful appear- 
ance of the king, but by reflecting on his own state, and 
by finding himself inexcusable. " When the King came 
in to see the guests, he saw there a man, which had not 
on a wedding garment ; and he said unto him. Friend, 
how earnest thou in hither, not having on a wedding 
garment ?" You are not properly qualified to be here : 
whose fault is it ? I allow you liberty to account for 
your conduct : speak. Is it my fault : are there no ha- 
bits in my wardrobe ? Is it the fault of my servants ? 
Have not they and the rest of the guests " wedding gar- 
ments?" Is it your fault: is the '' wedding ready: 
are all things ready :" and are you who was bidden 
not worthy ? "How earnest thou in hither ?" Speak. 
" And he was speechless :" he could make no reply to 
such reasonable questions. Here lies the agony of a 
man in trouble : and his anguish would abate, if he could 
Satisfy himself that he was brought into his present con- 
dition, not through his own neglect, but by means of others. 
He would cease to be an object of blame, and would 
become an object of pity, and the least that his judge 
could do for him would be to put him out of his misery. 
How hard must a man be driven to find reasons for sin, 
when his only hope is, that his destruction will be at- 
tributed not to himself, but to God ! What a desperate 
venture : rather, what a raving madness i Jesus Christ 



AT THE LAST DAY. 



301 



liath considered and determined the case, and he affirms 
the lost man will have nothing- to say, but will be 
" speechless :" but the lost man saith, he also hath con- 
sidered the case, and affirms, in contradiction to Jesus 
Christ, he shall not be speechless, but shall have to say, 
that God himself was the author of his destruction. In 
this case men do not act by conjecture without informa- 
tion ; but by obstinacy in direct opposition to it. This 
is a strange part for a man to act : surely none of you 
intend to act this part ! If you have flattered your- 
selves into a vain hope of succeeding, I conjure you to 
stop a few minutes, and examine this hopeless under- 
taking. Will you " provoke the Lord to jealousy ?" 
Are you " stronger than he ?" To a modest man, the 
declaration of Jesus Christ is sufficient : but, at present, 
we will lay that aside, and confirm what he says in the 
text by the determination of three infallible judges : by 
reason, which attends to the nature and fitness of things: 
by Scripture, which settles this point on principles of 
religion : and by experience, both that of others and 
that of yourselves. All these judges will say to thee, 
" Sit thou silent, and get thee i^^o darkness ; thy naketl- 
ness shall be uncovered, yea, thy shame shall be seen.'' 
When man lives and dies in a state of rebellion against 
God, and when he makes his appearance before him as 
the judge of the world, will he be able to justify his 
conduct ? This is the question, which we require rea- 
son to answer. Can such a man establish any facts, 
from which he can infer the blamelessness of his condi- 
tion ? The question is not, whether he be to blame for 
being in pain, but for committing sin ; for the pain of 
remorse is nothing but a necessary effect of the commis- 
sion of sin. The heathens have not the Gospel. Idiots 
are not to blame for not believing the Gospel, though 
they hear it; because they have not a natural capacity 
to understand what they hear. A man, who hath the 
Gospel, and capacity to understand it, cannot plead ei- 
ther of these facts in favour of his own unbelief, and 
consequently he can urge nothing to prove the reasona- 
bleness of it. On the contrary, if a man have faculties, 
the highest reason may be given why he should use 



302 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 

them : and if he have the Gospel, it is very fit and right 
that he should employ himself in those just and proper 
actipns, which the Gospel directs. The Gospel requires 
as to love God supremely, and assigns for a reason, that 
God is the chief good. It is impossible to deny the fact, 
that God is the chief good, and therefore it is impossi- 
l)le to deny the inference, that we ought to love him 
supremely. The same may be said of all the duties of re- 
ligion : they are nothing but inferences drawn from true 
facts, and if the facts be true, the inferences necessarily 
follow. It is on this principle that the Christian reli- 
gion is called a " reasonable service ;" that Christians 
are required to give " a reason of the hope that is in 
them ;" and that the wicked are required, in order to 
their conversion to "come and reason-' with the Lord. 
We conclude then, that reason condemns an impenitent 
sinner to silence, and that at the last day he will be 
" speechless ;" and the Scripture shows the inexcusa- 
bleness of the impenitent on the two grounds just now 
mentioned ; that they have the Gospel, and that they 
are capable of judging of it. Our Lord mentions the 
first in these words ; " If I had not come, and spoken 
unto them, they had not had sin : but now they have no 
cloak for their sin." The apostle Paul mentions the 
second in these words, " Whosoever thou art that judg- 
est, thou art inexcusable, O man ; for wherein thou judg- 
est another thou condemnest thyself: for thou that judg- 
est doest the same thing." The apostle proves that 
every man is capable of distinguishing right from wrong, 
and that every man doth actually make the distinction 
when he judges another man : and hence he infers, that 
he hath the same capacity to judge of his own actions, 
and is inexcusable for not doing so. For these reasons 
the text says, the unconverted man " was speechless." 
Did not daily observation put it out of our power to 
deny the fact, we could hardly believe that impenitent 
sinners would presume to urge Scripture in their favour. 
There are, however, three observations to be made 
concerning Scripture, which condemn such men to si- 
lence. First, God expressly declares he is not the au- 
thor of man's destruction. " Say unto them, as I live, 



AT THE LAST DAY. 303 

saith the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of 
the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and 
live. Judge, I pray you, betwixt me and my vineyard. 
What could have been done more to my vineyard, that 
I have not done in it V In a thousand places the in- 
spired writers speak this language in the name of God, 
and, if punishment be the effect of sin, it is impossible 
to charge God with our punishment, unless we lirst 
charge him with our sin, which would l3e abominable. 

Observe in the next place, God actually chargeth the 
sinner with his own destruction. " Hast thou not pro- 
cured this unto thyself ? O Israel, thou hast destroyed 
thyself" In this manner all the writers of Scripture 
express themselves, and all agree to charge home every 
man's ruin upon his own conscience. 

Observe, lastly, there is not a single article in the 
whole Christian religion to countenance the pretence 
of laying the blame on God : nothing in the doctrine of 
decrees, nothing in the doctrine of man's depravity, no- 
thing in the doctrine of Divine assistance, nothing in 
any doctrine to countenance such a plea. Hence, " the 
law" is said to speak so " that every mouth may be 
stopped, and all the world become guilty before God :" 
and hence the Gospel, far from being an apology for 
people in this condition, is an aggravation of their crime, 
and, by opening a door of hope to men under sentence 
of death by the law, must render thos« inexcusable, who 
do not avail themselves of such a provision of mercy. 
If the author of the Bible be not very sincere, and very 
much in earnest to instruct, convert, and save the souls 
of men, he acts a part unworthy of himself, unworthy 
of the pity of a friend, and much more so of the majesty 
of a God ; he irritates a grief, and insults a wretched- 
ness, which he cannot relieve. The Scripture, so far 
from excusing an impenitent man, renders all his ex- 
cuses to the last degree contemptible. If the Bible 
were a hard book, he might complain of difficulty ; if 
the benefits of religion were sold at a high price, he 
might complain of poverty ; if he had made trial and 
could not succeed, he might complain of Providence ; 
but if nothing of this can be said, there is no remedy, 



304 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 

and the impenitent, before his Judge, must be " speech- 
less." 

Let us come to experience. Of all kinds of knowledge 
that which is gained by trial and practice is the most 
certain, and, it should seem, there lies no appeal from 
our own experiments* We will then examine our sub- 
ject in the experience of three sorts of sinners. In 
the first instance we inquire of a true and real pen- 
itent. He once lived in sin, as some of you do now. 
He now lives in the daily exercise of faith and repent- 
ance, and he well remembers the whole history of his 
own life. Had you, good man, when you first discover- 
ed your condition, any thing to say in your own de- 
fence ? In that day when a judgment-seat was erected 
in your own bosom, when your sin was " set in order 
before your eyes," when reason, and religion, and 
conscience would be heard, had you any excuse fit to 
be urged in your own behalf? On the contrary, wast 
thou not " confounded," and didst thou not determine 
" never to open thy mouth any more because of thy 
shame ?" There was no thunder and lightning, no dis- 
eases and death, no''" heaven and earth fleeing away," 
no " dead standing before God," no " great white 
throne," no " books opening," no "lake of fire ;". 4here 
was nothing but the cool exercise of reason and con- 
science, and yet you " sat alone and kept silence," and 
" put your mouth in the dust, if so be there might be 
hope." And yet you was a young man, in perfect 
health, with a long life before you to be filled up with 
good actions : but if you were " speechless," if you could 
find neither a reason for continuing to sin, nor an apol- 
ogy for having dared to do so, how is it possible that 
impenitent men should have any thing to say in their own 
behalf at the day of judgment ? 

Examine a second class of sinners, who, to use the 
language of a Prophet, are taken, and are " ashamed as 
the thief is ashamed when he is found." Hear Pharaoh 
after all his vain boasting : " Moses, I have sinned. . The 
Lord is righteous, and I and my people are wicked. In- 
treat him that there be no more thunder, and I will let 
you go." This a true picture of many a sinner in a 



AT THE LAST DAY. oUD 

storm. In a fine day, " Who is the Lord that I should 
serve him? I know not the Lord, neither will I obey 
his voice." In a tempest, when the " everlasting king 
bringeth forth lightnings, and rain, and wind out of his 
treasures, the heathen are dismayed at the signs of hea- 
ven," and then, " call Moses and Aaron ; the Lord is 
righteous, and we are wicked." What ? Is the Lord 
more righteous, more powerful in a tempest than in a 
fine day ? Is not wickedness as reasonable in a storm 
as in a calm ? Are not thunderings and lightnings guar- 
dians and protectors of reason ? The sinner, in spite of 
his pretended ignorance knows they are, and trembles 
for himself, because he is in an unreasonable state. 
This is not being speechless : this is worse : this is pro- 
nouncing sentence on himself. Observe Belshazzar at 
a "great feast, drinking wine" with " a thousand of his 
lords, and his wives, and concubines," and singing pro- 
fane songs in honour of idolatry and debauchery. A 
hand writes three words in unknown characters on the 
v/all, and he becomes " speechless." " The king's coun- 
tenance was changed, and his thoughts troubled him, so 
that the joints of his loins were loosed, and his knees 
smote one against another." Observe Judas. He " re- 
pented himself," carried back the price of his treach- 
ery, said, "1 have sinned, in that I have betrayed inno- 
cent blood, and departed, and went and hanged himself." 
There are a few such cases recorded, and they may 
serve to direct us in regard to other cases not recorded, 
and whether the consciences of sinners be awakened in 
this world or not, they serve to convince us, that when- 
ever conscience doth awake, it will perform the same 
just but dreadful office ; so true is fjiat saying, " The 
wicked shall be silent in darkness, for by strength shall 
no man prevail." Let us not deceive ourselves : we 
may escape in this life, but at the last day a voice more 
terrible than the thunder that roused Pharaoh, recol- 
lection more keen than that of Judas, a hand more pow- 
erful than that which wrote the sentence of Belshazzar, 
will publish to every impenitent sinner, " Thou," thou 
also " art weighed in the balances and art found want- 
ing. Thou hast not humbled thine heart, though thou 
26* 



306 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL Bfi WITHOUT EXCUSE 

knowest all this : the God in whose hand thy breath is, 
and whose are all thy ways, hast thou not glorified." 
If such men as Belshazzar aud Pharaoh be struck dumb, 
what can he say, who hath lived under the light of the 
Gospel ? Certainly he will be " speechless." 

Once more, consult your own expedience, if indeed 
you have ever attended to what passes in your own bo- 
soms. Even men who live in sin, have moments of re- 
flection, and, we may venture to affirm, the language of 
all such reflections is, " O Lord, righteousness belong- 
eth unto thee, but unto us confusion of face, because we 
have sinned against thee. Evil is come upon us, yet 
made we not our prayer before God, that we might 
turn from our iniquities and understand thy 'truth." 
Where is the man, who can stand up and justify a life of 
sin ? Who would be so rash as to aggravate his offences 
by attributing wicked actions to righteous principles ? 
On what dangerous ground must a man go, who endeav- 
ours to reason in favour of a judge, who should give the 
rewards of virtue to a wilful sinner : who should sa}'^ to 
an ignorant and wicked wretch, in the last day, in the 
hearing of the whole world, '' Well done," blind blas- 
phemer ; well done, " covetous, boasters, proud, fierce, 
despisers of those that are good ;" well done, " traitors, 
lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God ;" well done, 
^' wicked and slothful servants," jou have borne a no- 
ble testimony to truth ; I am " an hai*d man, I do reap 
where I sowed not," you "ought" not "to have put my 
money to the exchangers, enter" you " into the joy of 
your Lord !" Such a perversion of justice as this might 
open your mouths ; but it would strike all heaven dumb, 
and every angel and every good man would be " speech- 
less !" There was a proverb among the Jews of great 
meaning, and it was sometimes used by wicked people : 
^' Had Zimri peace, who slew his master?" So Jezebel 
«aid to Jehu, and Jehu might have properly retorted. 
Had Jezebel peace, who slew Naboth ? Had Ahab 
peace, who " did sell himself to work wickedness" as 
" Jezebel, his wife, stirred him up ?" Hath any man 
peace in the practice of sin ? Hear a decision once for 
all. " The wicked man travelleth with pain all his days. 



AT THE LAST DAY. 307 

There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked. The 
■wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, 
whose waters cast up mire and dirt." 

Let us not resist the kind intention of Jesus Christ in 
describing the hopeless condition of an incorrigible sin- 
ner at the last day ; for he meant, by describing the 
horror of such a state, to excite us to avoid it. Such is 
the love of God to us, that he hath addressed the whole 
Scripture to our senses, and reason, and feelings, in or- 
der to engage self-love in the cause of truth and good- 
ness. Let us profit by this dispensation of mercy, and 
to this purpose, let us simplify the present subject, by 
so stating it that it may be understood, and by so en- 
forcing it that its motives may be felt now upon the spot 
without delay. 

We affirm, incorrigible sinners will be without ex- 
cuse at the last day. The last day seems a great way 
off, and excuses are doubtful ; let us therefore fix the 
excuse, and prove that incorrigible sinners are inexcus- 
able now. When the servants in the Parable said, 
■'^ Come, for all things are now ready, they all with one 
consent began to make excuse." We said, such people 
were inexcusable. Why ? What is required of them ? 
Strictly speaking, you are not required to obtain the 
end, but only to make use of the means. God hath con- 
nected the means and the end : the first is our duty, the 
last comes of course. God requires us to examine the 
Gospel whether it be worthy of credit : if we examine 
the Gospel impartially, we believe it: if we believe, 
we obey: if we obey, "obedience is pleasant, and we 
persevere : if we persevere, we " receive the end of 
our faith, even the salvation of our souls." The prop- 
er language therefore of excuse is, Ekcuse my not ex- 
amining the Gospel ; excuse my not so much as trying 
the truth or falsehood of it, and do not tax me with in- 
justice or imprudence for my conduct. We do not think 
it is in the power of any man to examine fairly the Gos- 
pel of Christ, and coolly to affirm, that there is not even 
n likelihood of its being true. Now if the Gospel be 
only likely to be true, we are able to prove that we are 
bound by every tie of justice and prudence to make it 



308 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 

the rule of our faith and practice. Yes, if we arc not 
able to prove the truth and goodness of the Gospel be- 
yond all possibility of suspicion and doubt, and if we 
could only prove that it was very likely to be true ; 
even in this case all rules of prudence would join to 
render the negligent inexcusable. If it be likely, that 
I at the last day should be in the " speechless" condi- 
tion of the man without the " wedding garment," I 
ought to do every thing in my power to avoid a condi- 
tion so shameful. The man, who says, the Gospel is 
not at all probable, hath not examined it, and we defy 
him to show any tolerable reason why he censures what 
he hath not examined. We do not say, be will be in- 
excusable at the last day ; we say he is inexcusable now. 
To convince you of this, let us hear him. 

This is the language, " I pray thee have me excused : 
1 have bought a piece of ground : I have bought five 
yoke of oxen : I have married a wife :" I am engaged 
in the necessary affairs of life, ^' and therefore I cannot 
come." There are two things remarkable in these ex- 
cuses ; the one is, that people of this sort pretend to 
act on principles, and assign reasons for their conduct : 
the other is, that the reasons assigned are true facts, 
but imply a falsehood, by supposing the duties of reli- 
gion to be inconsistent with the duties of life. Doth 
religion refuse a liberty of marrying? No: "marriage 
is honourable in all." Doth religion refuse to allow 
time for attention to business ? No : " Be thou diligent 
to know the state of thy flocks, and look well to thy 
herds, for riches arc not forever." There are two 
sorts of employments in life, the first lawful, the last un- 
lawful. There is nothing in religion inconsistent with 
lawful business ; but on the contrary, religion is neces- 
sary to the dispatch of it. Surely an industrious, sober, 
frugal, just, and pious man is better prepared to dis- 
charge all the duties of life than a man of opposite 
character. Religion indeed is inconsistent with unlaw- 
ful business : but so is reason, common sense, and the 
good of society. If a man sa^^s, " I pray thee have mc 
excused, for I must needs go" and defraud a minor, rob 
a widow, remove a land-iPiark, intoxicate one neigh- 



AT THE LAST DAY. 309 

bour, slander another, and enrich myself with the spoils 
of all; it is not religion that will complain of him ; all 
the oppressed will " clap their hands at him, hiss him 
out of his place," and say, " God forbid that we should 
justify you till we die." The most innocent of all em- 
ployments in the world, husbandry I mean, may become 
extremely wicked, and always does so, when it is pursu 
ed to the neglect of religion. Husbandmen rise early : 
they have therefore a litter opportunity to pray. Hus* 
bandmen leave off business early: they have therefore 
much cool evening leisure to devote to religion. Hus- 
bandmen have seasons in which they can do no business 
in the fields : they have then great opportunities for re- 
ligious improvement. Husbandmen have but few tempt- 
ations to dissipation : they have therefore great liberty 
to turn their attention to religion. Husbandmen, \yatch 
times and seasons, and are perpetually employed in 
examining the powers and productions of the earth : 
they therefore spend their days in a library of books 
written with the finger of God himself; " Man goeth 
forth to his work, and to his labour until the evening," 
and a very stupid man must he be, who doth not see 
reason to exclaim, " O Lord, how manifdld are thy 
works ! In wisdom hast thou made them all ; the earth 
is full of thy riches." Let no man say then, I have 
'' ground" and " oxen, and therefore I cannot come, I 
pray thee have me excused :" but let him rather say, I 
have " ground" and •' oxen," and therefore I can come ; 
and tillage, and feeding cattle, and all my emplo^mients 
will render me inexcusable, if I do not love and adore 
that God, who saith, " The ox knoweth his owner, and 
the ass his master's crib : but I have nourished and 
brought up children, and they have rebelled against me." 
The man in the text was not one of this sort ; he did 
enter into a profession of religion, and sat with the 
" guests," when •' the king came in to see" them ; for, 
my brethren, there are many unworthy professors of re- 
ligion, who are not born again, and who therefore have 
nothing of religion but the name. Let us examine these 
men, and as we have proved that it is a fault, and a man's 
own fault entirely, not to profess himself a disciple of 



310 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITKOUT EXCUSE 

Jesus Christ, so it is entirely the fault of a professor of 
religion, if he be no more than a professor. Every ex- 
cuse that can be urged why a disciple in name should not 
be a disciple in deed, is an aggravation of the offence, 
because the same reasons, which oblige a man to pro- 
fess himself a Christian, oblige him to be one. The 
man in the text may well be ^' speechless," for what can 
he say to the question, Friend, for such you profess 
yourself to be, ''how earnest thou in hither" without 
the dispositions of a friend ? Let any man in this as- 
sembW show a good substantial reason, why he is not a 
Christian in deed as well as in name. Can any reason 
be taken from religion itself, the employments of life, 
the condition of man, the perfections of God, or the 
state of the church, and the world ? 

We have said a thousand times, that the Christian 
religion is so easy to be understood, and all the duties 
of it so free from difficulty, that nothing but an excess 
of depravity can keep men destitute of it. Examine 
this question, " What doth the Lord require of thee V 
Doth he require thee to suppress thy desire of knowing, 
forbid thee to examine, and order thee to sink into the 
ignorance of a beast ? Doth he require thee to travel 
and studv, and search to find out a religion proper to 
glorify him, and to satisfy you ? Doth he require 
" thousands of rams, or ten thousands of rivers of oil," 
offerings beyond thine ability to procure ? Doth he re- 
quire you to sacrifice the dearest comforts of life, your 
" first-born for your transgression, the fruit of your body 
for the sin of your soul ?" Nothing of all these. He 
doth not require thee to find out a religion : " he hath 
shewed thee" one. He doth not require thee to waste 
thy property : but to do good with it ; " he hath shew- 
ed to thee, O man, what is good." He doth not require 
thee to crucify thine affections, but to gratify them ; 
" What doth the Lord require of thee but to love mer- 
cy ?" He doth not require thee to rack thine invention 
first to commit sin, and then to conceal the horror of it ; 
but he requires thee to be useful and happy by " doing 
justly." He doth not expect thee to flame with the 
zeal of an angel, or to preach with the powers of an 



AT THE LAST DAY. 31 i 

apostle ; " What doth the Lord require of thee but to 
walk humbly with thy God ?" He doth not expect thee 
to act without rule, or to believe without proof: but 
when he condescends to set before you proofs to produce 
conviction, and laws to regulate all your actions : when 
his condescension stoops to render those proofs and rules 
so " plain, that he may run that readeth them ;" what 
can be said of you, except what a Prophet declares, 
" Behold, his soul is not uprig-ht in him V 

Would you think it. Christians? this want of upright- 
ness, this depraved condition of man, becomes in the 
mouth of the person whom we are reproving, an excuse 
for his continuance in sin : and yet this very depravity 
is a strong reason to induce men to flee for succour to 
religion. What a perverse way of talking is this ! I 
am ignorant, and therefore I ought not to search the 
Scriptures to become wise. I am weak, and disinclined 
to my duty, and therefore I ought not to examine the 
motives of religion, lest they should compel me to per- 
form my duty. I am '' in danger of hell fire" for living 
in anger and malice, and therefore, though Jesus Christ 
hath instructed men how to avoid the flames of future 
punishment, yet 1 ought not to follow his directions. I 
am in a state of guilt, God treats me as a parent would 
a froward child, and sets before me forgiveness and fa- 
vour, and therefore I ought to '' despise the riches of 
his goodness," and afi'ect "not to know that the good- 
ness of God leadeth to repentance." I must die, and if 
I " believe not" that Jesus is the Messiah, I shall " die 
in my sins : faith is the gift of God," and God hath said, 
*' If any of you lack wisdom let him ask of God, that giv- 
eth to ail men liberally, and upbraideth not ; and it shall 
be given him." I cannot ask with such fervour and 
spirituality as I ought, and therefore I determine not to 
ask at all. " Faith cometh by hearing :" I will hear, 
but I will not so hear as to determine me to believe : I 
ought to hear the sound of the Gospel, but I ought not 
to attend to the sense and meaning, lest 1 should receive 
a conviction that the truths taught are worthy of cred- 
it. In a word, I ought to profess Christianity as if it 
were true, and to live as if it were false : I ought (for I 



312 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 
t 

am a fallen, depraved creature) to act tlie part of Judas, 
saying, " Whomsoever 1 shall kiss, that same is guilty 
of death, hold him fast." This is the wayward language 
of the life of an unconverted professor of the Christian 
religion. His words are, " I cannot :" but Christ, who 
knows him better than he knows himself, says, " He will 
not." If a man had made the trial, but could not suc- 
ceed, there would be some reason in an excuse taken 
from depravity : but with what face can a man, who 
never examines, complain that he cannot understand ? 

Is there any thing in the employments of life to fur- 
nish an excuse for the neglect of religion ? To rfeduce 
the question to a narrow compass, suffer me to ask. Is 
there any employment on the Lord's day that can fur- 
nish such an excuse ? That day is purposely set apart 
for religious exercises, and if that one day be properly 
spent, religion must be understood, and if it be under- 
stood on the first day of the week, it will be practised 
the other six days. I do not say, a man cannot employ 
himself on that day in exercises inconsistent with reli- 
gion. Alas ! how much business do our sinful passions 
engage us to do on that day ! What idleness! What 
sauntering about! W^hat insignificant visits! What 
senseless labours do some men employ themselves in on 
the Lord's day ! Let us however remember, that both 
religion and law require us to spend the day in the ser- 
vice of God ; and of all men husbandmen are the least 
excusable if they profane the Lord's da}^ Custom over- 
comes law and religion in some towns and cities, and 
compels many a weary worldling to perpetual drudg- 
ery, not excepting even the Lord's day : but in the 
country, where there are no fairs, no markets, no la- 
bours of the field, nothing to interrupt ; how intolerable 
is the excuse of worldly employments ! You may on 
the Lord's day hear the Gospel ; you may read it and 
hear it read ; you may converse with one another on 
the meaning ; you may pray yourselves, and you may 
join with your fellow Christians in social prayer: what 
may you not do of this kind without neglecting any one 
honest employment of life ? There are in the four Gos- 
pels only eighty-nine chapters, and were each family to 



AT THE LAST DAY. 315 

read only two cbnpters each Lord's day, the whole 
would be examined in much less than one year, and con- 
sequently the excuse, which ignorance ta'^es from basi- 
ness, is to the last degree contempiibie. The man who 
would make this excuse must, in his own opinion, be 
" speechless.'" 

I said, some men pretend to take excuses for their 
negligence from the perfections of God : but to speak 
more properly, they take them from the imperfections 
of God. They ascribe imperfections to him, which are 
impossible to his nature, an.l then they reason from these 
imaginary defects. Hear one of these wicked and sloth- 
ful servants, who though he had hid his Lord's talent, 
yet presumed to describe God as if he had spent his 
life in improving it. " I knew thee. Lord, that thou 
art a hard man, reaping where thou hast not sowed, 
and gathered where thou hast not strawed :" that is, I 
have formed such a notion of God as good men form of 
the devil, and I have acted accordingly : " I was afraid, 
and went and hid Xhy talent in the earth." You see, 
such a faith, such a practice. Nothing is more com- 
mon than for men to form gross notions of God, and as 
surely as they do form them, they act agreeably to their 
notions. " Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such 
an one as thyself." And what saith God to such vain 
thinkers ? " Unto the wicked God saith, What hast 
thou to do to declare my statutes, or that thou shouidst 
take my covenant in thy mouth, seeing thou hatest in- 
struction, and casteth my words behind thee ?" Thou 
idle soul, thou, who didst never in thy life spend one 
single hour in studying the nature and government of 
God, dost thou pretend to describe him? Be "speech- 
less :" thou knowest nothing of this subject. No, there 
is nothing in any of the perfections of God to furnish an 
unconverted man with an excuse for his sin. Will he 
speak of the goodness of God ? But he insults that good- 
ness. Will he speak of his power ? But the power of 
God is the guardian of a good man, not of a rebel from 
the demands of justice. WjU he speak of the wisdom 
of God, and tell how able he is to inform the mind, and 
change the heart in a dying moment ? But what right 
27 



314 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE 

hath he, who neglects the ordinary means of instruc- 
tion, to expect extraordinary and unpromised assist- 
ance ? What if God, provoked with your conduct, 
should say to you, as he said to the obstinate Jews, " Be- 
hold, I am against thee !" All my perfections wait 
to befriend thee : but all my perfections condemn thy 
conduct, and all will be employed to punish thee at last, 
if thou continuest incorrigible. Miserable sinner ! say, 
if thou hast the heart, I would serve God; but he is im- 
patient, and difficult to be pleased. I would seek him ; 
but he is unjust and unkind, and will not forgive my de- 
fects, nor reAvard my labours. I would serve him : but 
he lies in wait to deceive me, and sets his power to re- 
sist me. I would love him as my chief good ; but his 
nature is not enough to render me happy : either he 
doth not know how to make the wretched happy, or he 
will not give his knowledge effect. Miserable man ! Is 
it out of thy power to say thus ? Art thou obliged to 
avow the direct contrary ? And how then wilt thou 
look the Judge of the world in the face ? Ah ! thou 
wilt be " speechless." 

Some are so hard driven for excuses as to take them 
from the state of the churchy and from that of the world. 
The church, say they, is thin, poor, persecuted, and 
some of the members of it fall into sin "seven times," 
and even sin against one another " seventy times seven 
times in a day." True, some good men of bad consti- 
tution and in strong temptation do trespass against their 
brethren many times in a day ; but they " turn again" 
as many times, "saying. We repent;" from hence you 
argue that you, who perpetually sin, but never repent, 
ought to be forgiven ! Is this fair ? True, " the just 
man falleth seven times," but he " riseth again," and 
" seven times a day praiseth God because of his right- 
eous judgments :" and hence you infer, that you who 
lie perpetually in wickedness ought to be applauded for 
doing so. How is it, that while you observe the fail- 
ings of good men, you are blind to their excellencies, 
and to the greater excellencies of others who have not 
their failings ? Is it the failings of these men that you 
disapprove ? I fear you rejoice in their faults, and dis- 



AT THE LAST DAY. 315 

like their virtues. What if the church be thin, and poor, 
and persecuted, is it the less respectable on these ac- 
counts ? Is it not the more so ? These are the faithful 
souls, who realize what Peter promised, and each saith 
to Jesus Christ, " Although all shall be offended, yet 
will not I. If I should die with thee, I will not deny 
thee in any wise." These Christians ought to strike 
thee dumb ; they have put it out of thy power to say, 
religion is impracticable. On your principles Christ 
and only twelve apostles, and they all in an upper 
room persecuted, " as when one doth hunt a partridge 
in the mountains," would have furnished you with 
an excuse as much more plausible as twelve are less 
than twelve hundred thousand. Your eyes, 1 per- 
ceive, are in the world, and thence you fetch excu- 
ses ; but, as there would be no end of following such 
vain pretences, so we venture to say once for all, that if 
the whole world were up in arms against God, you 
ought, like Noah, to attend to the just and merciful 
voice, that saith, " The end of all flesh is come, behold 
the earth is filled with violence, 1 will destroy them ; 
but come thou, and all thy house, into the ark." Who 
but a madman would perish for the sake of company ! 

After all, what are excuses of this kind good for? 
What end do they answer except that of colouring a 
black and desperate cause, a cauge of rebellion against 
God, and wickedness, and wretchedness, and high trea- 
son against ourselves ? Is there any thing in stupidity 
and sin worth all this, and can any thing be supposed so 
horrible, as that man should rack his invention to sink 
himself into the condition of a brute ? How flimsy will 
all these excuses appear when sickness and death come ? 
True, such a man will not be troubled with our exhort- 
ations then : but his conscience, his own conscience will 
accuse him ; " he shall flee from the iron weapon, but 
the bow of steel shall strike him through. The heavens 
shall reveal his iniquity, and the earth shall rise «p 
against him." For my part, I have consulted my pity, 
and if it were possible for me to frame an excuse, and 
to affirm, that man ought to be allowed to live in sin, I 
would not conceal it. Why should we conceal any 



'316 INCORRIGIBLE SINNERS WILL BE WITHOUT EXCUSE, &LC. 



thing- that is just and right? but if any thing be unjust, 
why should we not expose it? No, we can find no ex- 
cuse, and we declare, in the face of heaven and earth, 
that as the salvation of the righteous is ail of the Lord, 
so the destruction of the wicked is all of themselves ; 
and an unconverted professor of religion is inexcusable 
now for living in sin, will be inexcusable when he dies 
for dying in sin, and when the Judge shall require an 
account of his conduct at the last day, will be inexcusa- 
ble and '' speechless." 

I finish with two reflections. First, let our text be 
an apology, if any apology be necessary, for the minis- 
try, which your teachers exercise among you. They 
believe Jesus Christ, see the day a coming-, dread the 
consequence^ to you, and endeavour to save you, "with 
fear pulling you out of the tire." Happy, happy in the 
highest degree, should God succeed our labours ! Let 
the text also reconcile Christians to all they meet with 
here. What are afflictions, what are persecutions, what 
are the most severe trials in comparison with the shame 
and disgrace foretold in the text ? Now the Christian 
may be, on many fashionable subjects, " as a dumb man 
that openeth not his mouth," and in whose lips there is 
no swearino', no slander, no falsehood, " no guile :" but in 
that day he will not be " speechless," he will be with- 
out fault before the throne of God, and will " cry with 
a loud voice, Salvation to our God, and unto the Lamb 
forever and ever. Amen." God grant you all this 
grace. To him be honour and glory forever. Amen.. 



DISCOUESE XVI. 

ANV PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, MAY TEACH IT. 

lAT WICKHAM.1 



1 CORINTHIANS xiv. 31. 

Ye may all prophesy one hy one^ that all may learn^ and 
all be comforted. 

Much as I admire the modest soul that uttered these 
words, and greatly as I think they contribute to public 
edification, I confess freely to you, I should have had no 
heart to speak on the subject to night, had I not recol- 
lected a passage of Scripture, which I shall mention 
presently : for what am I about ? I am going to try to 
convince you, that any person, who understands the 
Christian religion, may teach it. I say, I should have 
had no heart to teach this, for what a difference is there 
between us and the church at Corinth, to whom the text 
is addressed ! " Jesus Christ had enriched them in all 
knowledge, and in all utterance, so that they came be- 
hind in no gift." When they assembled for the worship 
of God, one had" a psalm," another "a doctrine," a third 
" a tongue," a fourth " a revelation," a fifth '' an inter- 
pretation," so that an ignorant unbeliever, if he cam€ into 
the assembly, would be informed, and convinced, and 
would be obliged to " report, that God was in them of a 
truth." This was not peculiar to the church at Corinth, 
for these gifts were not bestowed with a niggardly hand, 
but in rich abundance on all the churches, and the vain 
27* 



318 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

boast of the king of Assyria was a sober truth in the 
mouth of Jesus Christ, " Are not my princes altogether 
kings ?" Happy for mankind, these eminent men were 
saints, and their mighty powers were not dangerous in- 
struments of mischief, not causes of " confusion, but of 
peace in all the churches." 

How different are Christian churches now ! The 
primitive Christians understood religion in all its parts ; 
^but we have forgotten some, added others, and perplex- 
ed all. They understood each part in all its extent ; 
but we seldom trace a truth backward to its spring, or 
forward to its outfall. They knew what to say, and 
where to stop ; but we rashly decide what they durst 
not determine, and have nothing to say on their chief 
subjects. Far from bringing a psalm or a doctrine to 
increase the stock, we can hardly carry them home in 
our memories when they are given us. We go to Chris- 
tian assemblies, not like bees to their own hives, each 
to contribute a little to the general store ; but like bees 
burnt out of their own hives to carry away the labours of 
others. In this, too general a case, who can wonder we 
should be slow to teach the doctrine of the text ? 

However, we are emboldened to teach this branch of 
Christian doctrine, not only from a consideration of its 
general usefulness, but from a declaration of God him- 
self to Moses : " I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, 
and unto Jacob, by the name of God Almighty, but by 
my name Jehovah, was I not known to them." Hence 
I infer, that religious knowledge is in different degrees 
in different men, who yet are ail excellent in their kind. 
Jehovah was a name, which God condescended to take 
(for all names are beneath his dignity), to convey to 
Moses proper ideas of such perfections as he was about 
to display to suit the circumstances of the poor enslaved 
Israelites ; and this name conveyed more knowledge of 
God than the Patriarchs had been favoured with, as 
their circumstances had not required so much informa- 
tion. Jehovah was a great name ; but Jesus Christ 
taught us God under a much greater, by directing us to 
call him Our Father, abating nothing of the majesty of 
Jehovah, while he united with it the mildness of a pa- 



MAY TEACH IT. 319 

rent. In the absence of Christ, who would not give Mo- 
ses a hearing ? In the absence of Moses, who would not 
think himself honoured to sit at the feet of Abraham ? 
" The least apostle is greater than John the Baptist," 
but in the absence of the least of the apostles, who 
would not, '' for a season, rejoice" in that " burning and 
shining light," John the Baptist? The Corinthians, and 
their extraordinary gifts have failed : but " charity nev- 
er faileth ; charity that covereth a multitude" of faults, 
" charity abideth ;" and as long as this excellent dispo- 
sition, which " suffereth long, and is kind," which " en- 
vieth not, and vaunteth not itself," which " doth not be- 
have itself unseemly," and " seeketh not its own," which 
" is not easily provoked," and '' thinketh no evil," which 
" rejoiceth not in iniquity but in the truth," which 
"beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all 
things, endureth ail things :" as long as this gentle and 
generous love abideth, so long may we say, "- Ye may 
all prophesy," that is, teach, " one by one, that all may 
learn, and ail may be comforted." 

To assist you in this excellent work, I will endeavour 
to show j^ou how to understand religion . . . and how to 
teach it to others . . . and we will close by proving your 
right to do both. When God, in a vision, said in the 
hearing of Isaiah, and in the presence of a circle of glo- 
rious seraphims, " Whom shall I send, and who will go 
for us ?" the Prophet, though he thought himself, as 
well he might in such company, " a man of unclean 
lips," could not suppress the feelings of his honest heart, 
but said, "Here am I, send me." Happy if Christians 
had such a modest zeal ! Happy the heart that says, 
Let me have the honour of pulling at least one soul 
" out of the fire." Do you know what God saith to such 
a man ? He ordered an apostle to " let him know, that 
he, who converteth any sinner from the error of his 
way, shall save his soul from death, and shall hide a 
muiiitude of sins." 

Among a thousand reasons to enforce the doctrine of 
the text, there is one, which always strikes me very 
forcibly. We complain of the general ignorance of 
Christians ; they do not understand their own religion. 



320 ANY PERSON", WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

Why ? They do not think it a duty to understand any 
other parts than those which immediately concern them- 
selves : the rest they leave to their teachers, and ex- 
cept it be here and there an elect soul, most Christians 
believe a whole, understand only a part, and satisfy 
themselves with a persuasion that their teachers under- 
stand the rest. Take a youth of this kind out of one of 
our families, inform him that he is to teach religion, 
and directly he applies himself to understand it wholly. 
The same effect would follow any man's persuasion, that 
it was his duty to teach ; for he would be instantly per- 
suaded that it was his duty first to understand it himself. 
This therefore is " a doctrine according to godliness," 
and one chief recommendation of it is, that it strength- 
ens every man's obligation to knowledge and virtue. 
God forbid we should sacrifice the virtue of all the bre- 
thren to the consequence of one ! 

I said, any person, who understands religion, may 
teach it : the first duty therefore is to understand it, and 
in order to this I shall give you four exhortations found- 
ed on four first principles of religion. 

I exhort you first to search the Scriptures; on this 
ground, the Scriptures contain the whole of revealed 
religion. The Old Testament contains the religion of 
the Jews, a great part of which is incorporated into the 
New Testament, which contains the whole religion of 
Christians. Strictly speaking, the four Gospels contain 
the pure religion of Christians, and the Acts of the 
Apostles, and the Epistles are comments, or annotations 
on the Gospels : the Revelation is a prophecy, in which 
many moral sentences are mixed. Our Lord considers 
the Old Testament as introductory to the New in these 
words, " The Law and the Prophets were until John : 
since that time the kingdom of God is preached." That 
the Acts and the Epistles are comments on the Gospels, 
you may easily convince yourselves. To give you on- 
ly one example. In the twenty-third of Matthew, the 
latter end of the twelfth of 3Iark, and the eleventh of 
Luke, our Lord exhorts his disciples to beware of 
Scribes, Pharisees, and the '•'• grievous burdens" of Jew- 
ish ceremonies, with which they loaded down religion ; 



HAY TEACH IT. 321 

and he charged them neither to become masters over 
the consciences of men, nor to suifer other men to rule 
theirs, for, saith he, you have " one Father in heaven, 
and one Master, even Christ." The fifteenth of Acts is 
a history of an attempt made " to put" the Jewish " yoke 
upon the neck of the disciples ;" and the Epistle to the 
Galatians is a comment on the doctrine, and iinisheth 
with these remarkable words ; " From henceforth let 
no man trouble me ; for I bear in ray body the marks of 
the Lord Jesus." It was a custom, both Avith Jews and 
Gentiles, to mark their servants : " his master shall bore 
his ear through with an awl, and he shall serve him 
forever." I am a servent of Christ, as if the Apostle 
had said, and enter thoroughly into his doctrine, as I ad- 
vise you to do, and neither to be slaves to your forefa- 
thers, nor tyrants to your successors. " One is my 
Master, even Christ." Lay it down therefore as a sol- 
id ground of action, that the Scriptures contain the 
whole of religion, and every thing necessary to the faith 
and practice of a good man, and though each of you 
would be justified in receiving the Scriptures so, if j^ou 
were singular, and no other person in the world receiv- 
ed them so, yet you may be emboldened by recollect- 
ing, that the whole Protestant world join with you in 
maintaining this truth. There was a man " greatly be- 
loved," who was " shewn things noted in the Scripture 
of truth," when there was " none that held with" the 
teacher of "these things, but Michael their prince." 
The example of " an archangel" wr?s more than that of 
the whole empire of Babylon, and the prophet Daniel 
was justified in following such a guide. You are not in 
this condition ; and should you say, " I, even I only am 
left," the answer of God would be, I have reserved to 
myself " seven thousand men, who have not bowed the 
knee to Baal." 

Our second word of advice is, read the Scriptures 
as they were written, for they were not .written as they 
are now printed. The writers wrote "by inspiration 
of God," as it was more necessary that they should be 
inspired to write the Gospel than to preach it ; because 
after preaching they were alive to explain themselves, 



322 ANY PERSON. 

but there lies no appeal from their writings. The pro- 
per way of reading the Gospels is to take what all the 
four Evangelists say on any one subject, and to put the 
whole together. The four Evangelists stand before us 
exactly in the light of four witnesses in a court. The 
first comes in, and relates what he knows of the fact ; 
the second does the same, and so do the other two. 
Now on summing up the evidence, two things will give 
weight to the witnesses, and both will establish the truth 
of the facts. The witnesses all agree in attesting the 
same facts, and so confirm the truth of the facts. The 
witnesses all differ in some circumstances of these facts, 
in the times, places, and order of relating them ; and 
this difference which hath not the shadow of a contra- 
diction, clearly proves that the witnesses had not con- 
sulted together to make up a false tale to impose on 
mankind. 

I said, the Scriptures are not printed as they were 
written. In the times of the Apostles, what we call 
stops were in use in the schools, and were made use of 
by masters to teach young gentlemen, not the sense so 
much as the sound of words ; and the Scriptures, which 
were not intended for school books, were not marked in 
this manner, but were written right on, and the best and 
only rule of determining the proper place of a stop, a 
pause, or a division of any part of the Scriptures, is to 
follow the direction of common sense, as you do in read- 
ing a letter, which you sit down to make out, and get 
into the meaning of. Schoolmasters have carried this 
art of easing hard things to their scholars so far, that 
some parents complain that they have made learning too 
easy, and the young gentlemen have acquired the sound 
of every thing, and the sense of nothing. In like man- 
ner, gentlemen by dividing the Scriptures into chapters 
and verses, and by stopping words in order to make the 
book easy, have rendered attention seemingly so unne- 
cessary, that the book is the most read, and the least 
understood of any book. We love ease ; but we should 
remember the ease of ignorance is only an easy death. 
When you read the Scriptures then, read right on, nev- 
er look at stops ; your sense will stop where the story 



MAY TEACH IT. 323 

ends, and I hope you will not leave off in the middle of 
what you desire thoroughly to understand. It is a high 
honour that God doth us ; he placeth each of us in the 
condition of a "judge betwixt him and his vineyard." 
We pretend to hold court. In the presence of men and 
angels he sends his " witnesses, a spectacle unto the 
world, to angels, and to men." And what do we ? do we 
sit and hear the whole patiently, suspend our judg- 
ments, and at length make up our minds ? Alas ! as 
they " reason of righteousness, temperance, and judg- 
ment to come," we adjourn the court, "Go thy way for 
this time, when I have a convenient season, I will call 
for thee." So we " shew the Jews a pleasure ;" but 
" leave Paul bound." After a life spent in such trifling, 
we go into our places of worship, and say to every 
teacher of Christianity, " How long dost thou make us 
to doubt?" If Jesus " be the Christ, tell us plainly." 

Turn down, now you are here, and examine when 
you go home, these two or three passages. The last 
verse of the nineteenth of Matthew belongs to the twen- 
tieth chapter. The last verse of the twenty-first of 
Acts belongs to the twenty-second ^hapter. The first 
of the seventh chapter of the second Epistle to the Co- 
rinthians belongs to the chapter before. The same may 
be said of a great number of chapters and verses. In 
regard to stops, take two examples: the apostle Paul 
says, "Being justified by faith we have peace with 
God." Some put the stop at the word/aii^, and say, 
men are forgiven their sins on believing the Gospel, for 
the Scripture saith, we are "justified by faith." Oth- 
ers put the stop at the word justified^ and say, we are 
ibrgiven our sins on account of the righteousness of 
Christ, and thus being justified, " by faith we have 
peace with God." So again in this passage of Jesus 
Christ to the thief on the cross. " I say unto thee to 
day shalt thou be with me in paradise." One puts the 
stop at thee^ and says, the thief went with Christ that day 
to heaven, for it is written, " To day shalt thou be in 
paradise." Another says, the thief did not go to hea- 
ven that day, and Jesus Christ only told him, "I say 
unto thee to-day, thou shalt be with me," that is, 



324 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANIXy, 

some time hence thou shalt be with me " in paradise.''* 
I think the former the true sense. You will say, all 
this requires attention, thought, and a diligent exercise. 
True, and for this reason I urge the practice. You maj 
indeed, by such means, entertain very different ideas of 
the same Scriptures ; but as there is no state so danger- 
ous as that of dead ignorance, and no heresy like that 
of imposing unexamined senses of Scripture on the con- 
sciences of tame believers, so while you retain the char- 
ity that " hopeth ail things," you may, and ought to ex- 
amine the Scriptures for yourselves. 

Our third word of advice is, as you read, dare to think 
for yourselves. Read the Scriptures with a generous 
love of truth, and aiways believe yourselves as free to 
think and judge for yourselves, as any other creatures 
in the world are. Suppose this assembly, having* never 
seen a New Testament, were assembled to day by the 
express command of God, to receive every person one 
from the hands of Jesus Christ himself; and suppose 
him to come into the congregation, followed by the 
Evangelists, and the Apostles, with the books to deliv- 
er ; and suppose hipi to say to each of us when we ac- 
cepted the present, " Search the Scriptures, for in them 
you think you have eternal life, and they are they 
which testify of me." Is it imaginable, that at the next 
meeting, or at any future time, one of us would have a 
right to say to another. You, countrymen, search the 
Scriptures ! You ought not to think about the Scrip- 
tures ; at least you ought to think of them as I do ; or if 
that be impossible, jom ought to say you do ; or if you 
refuse that, you ought to be silent and say nothing; and 
if you persist in pretending to have as much right to 
search, and think, and speak, as I have, you ought to be 
driven out of the assembly. I will not set fire to you, 
for I hate persecution ; but I will render your situation 
so unhappy that you shall be obliged to remove your- 
self. To remove out of a Christian church for peace ! 
For the sake of peace to quit the territories of the 
" Prince of peace," inhabited by the '•'• sons of peace;" 
what a project, what a mad project is this ! And where 
are people to go in search of peace, when it is not to 



MAY TEACH IT. 3^ 

be found in a Christian church ? For your parts, my 
brethren, your folly and guilt must be great, if you do 
not enter thoroughly into this part of our subject, for 
you have not even the plea of a temptation to excuse 
your negligence ; and so far from having " many mas- 
ters, you have not one "Diotrephes, who loveth to 
have pre-eminence among you." Should such a savage 
ever rise up among you, say of him, " This is a deceiv- 
er, and an antichrist." Keep thinking as free as 
breathing, and, if any church be a prison, filled with 
foul and mfectious air, let self-preservation induce you 

Lh rh •'. ^'"' ^"^ ^"""^'^ ''^P''"-^ tl^e misery of 
r»fh ^■^"*^''^"' «' -choose to live and die in shackles, 

mad:ftemfreT!""''' "'^-"'^ wherewith Christ hatlj 

Our last word of advice is, Reduce m much Christianitv 

as you know to practice. Remember the saying of Je- 

the dtT-' '^r^"""" '^"'''"'''^ "'"'' heshallknowof 
Iflt f'°^' r *'""'" " "'" °^<^°'^' "■• 'Whether I speak 
of myself.' For example, you know it is the duty of a 
Christian to pray. Exercise yourselves in prayer then 
t IS the duty of a Christian pVent to teach hi chUd: 
ren. Instruct your children then; and so of the rest 
As you practise religion, you will make an experiment 
of the ease and pleasure of religious practice ; and^on- 
sequentlyyou will grow more Ind more into a persua- 
sion that the knowledge of God is the chief good of man 
Practise the duties of religion freely and "openCand 
ever look an enemy in the face. I recollect an exam 
pie m the Old Testament. In the time of the j" 
the Midianites and the Amalekites used to come at hS 
yest-time" as grasshoppers for multitude," and carry 
away catt e and corn, so that the Israelites had no ZZ 
nance left, and, not aware of their own streno-th they 
hid themselves in dens and caves. Gideon raised 'an ar^ 

TZf^^T^ir'^'"'^^"^ '"'='' '» "d the country of 
he e bold robbers. The Lord, to convince this people 
that he was a patron of freedom, and that they, actiW 
properly, had nothing to foar, reduced the amy t? 
three hundred. These were furnished with trumpet; 
pitchers, and lamps, and with the clatter of breaking ^he 



326 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

pitchers, with holding up the lights, with blowing the 
trumpets, and shouting, " The sword of the Lord, and 
of Gideon," they frighted this innumerable multitude 
away like a flock of fowls. A great lesson ; for tyrants 
are not unfrequently cowards, and Israel must blush that 
they had not acquired a victory so cheap before. To 
them, and to all other men acting properly in the fear 
of God, it may be truly said, " One of you shall chase a 
thousand, for the Lord is he that fighteth for you." Let 
no Christian be ashamed of any part of his holy profess- 
ion ; let him reduce every command of God to practice, 
both such as are in the good graces of the world, and 
such as are out of fashion, and therefore contemptible. 
To sum up this matter, we advise all Christians to read 
the Scriptures, to read them so as to understand them, 
to expound them to themselves by their own good sense, 
and by a diligent course of holy obedience. 

On supposition you understand religion yourselves, 
we proceed to show you " how to teach it to others." 
We suppose first the welfare of your children to lie 
nearest your heart. In vain you provide the comforts 
of life, and a settlement in the world for them, without 
training them up in the principles of religion. It is 
like loading a boat with valuable commodities, and send- 
ing it down a stream into the ocean, without any animal 
except a jackdaw aboard. These principles ought to 
be imparted in a manner suited to their own dignity, to 
yours, and to that of your children. All truths have a 
worth : but the truths of religion are the first in value, 
and ought to be the first in rank. Such subjects as the 
Scripture calls " milk for babes" are not mean ; for there 
is nothing mean in religion, but of the same kind with 
others called " strong meat." The skill of a teacher is 
seen in the choice of such plain and easy parts of reli- 
gion as are proper to inform tender minds, and they sit 
easy on such minds when they are admitted freely to 
place themselves in the understanding. Let not the un- 
derstanding be degraded into the seat of a beggar, a 
mere bench by the road side to hold whatever is put 
upon it : but train it up to know its own dignity, to re- 
fuse to admit what doth not appear to be true, and to 



MAY TEACH IT. 327 

preserve its rank as a seat of truth, a throne of God. 
Preserve also your own dignity as a parent. The fa- 
ther of a family is not a keeper of a prison to subdue 
by bloAvs and hard fare : but he is like himself when he 
resembles a wise and placid patriarch. The Jewish 
schools were formed on this plan, and Paul, who was 
brought up ''at the feet of Gamaliel," was ''taught ac- 
cording to the perfect manner of the law of the fathers.*' 
Our Lord, when a youth, was " sitting" in such a school 
*' in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them and 
asking them questions." No sullen orders, no hard, 
stern commands, accompanied with threatnings, not to 
understand, but to get by heart what cannot be under- 
stood, and what therefore the pain of learning prepares 
the heart to abhor. Man is a noble creature, and a lit- 
tle man in arms is a little " image of God." Providence 
gives us children, each with this charge, " Take this 
child and nurse it for me :" take care of its health, cher- 
ish its understanding, form its nianners, prepare it to 
be a citizen of " the heavenly Jerusalem," a compan- 
ion " of angels, and of the spirits of just men made per- 
fect." Far be it from you to spend life in contending 
for mastery with them, in subduing a free-born soul in- 
to the servile temper of a slave, in applying the disci- 
pline of a mere animal to a creature endued with rea- 
son and sense, in bringing forward sorrow before the 
calamities of life oblige them to suifer and to mourn, in 
neglecting to cultivate a soil so very improveable : far 
from your habitations be all such methods of mismanag- 
ing children. 

There are two general ways of teaching children the 
truths of religion. Some make use of catechisms, which 
children are made to get by heart. This is an exer- 
cise of the memory, but not of the understanding, and 
therefore nothing is more common than to find children, 
who can repeat a whole catechism, without knowing 
any thing more than how to repeat it. The hardest cat- 
echisms are certainly the worst ; but the most plain are 
nothing but an exercise of memory. The chief recom* 
mendation of them is, they save a parent a great deal of 
trouble : but does not the death of a child save yOu a 



328 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

great deal more ? Yet who would part with her child 
on that ground ? The other method is by hearing them 
read some little histories of Scripture, and by asking 
them questions to set them a thinking and judging for 
themselves. This is an exercise of the understanding, 
and when the understanding is taught its own use, it is 
set a going true, and if it gets no future damage, it will 
go true through life. In order to instruct our children, 
we should inform ourselves ; otherwise they may put us 
to the blush, and on this principle Joshua enforced re- 
ligious knowledge among the Jews, " that," saith he, 
•' when your children ask their fathers in time to come, 
saying. What mean you by these stones ? Then ye shall 
answer them, The waters of Jordan were cut off," and 
so on. 

You should teach religion by conversation. There is 
an holy art of conversing on the subjects of religion, 
and the first in this, as well as in every other excellence, 
was Jesus Christ. " Master," said one of his disciples 
as he went out of the temple, " see what manner of 
stones, and what buildings are here." Hence Jesus 
took occasion to speak of the destruction of the temple, 
the accomplishment of the prophecy of Daniel, the end 
of the world, and the nature and necessity of watchful- 
ness. When the tax-gatherers came to Peter, and said, 
" Doth your master pay tribute ?" Jesus replied, " Yes," 
and went into the house ; and hence he took occasion to 
show the injustice of the Romans for taxing strangers, 
and sparing their own citizens : we are taxed, and they 
are free ; however, " lest we should offend them, go" 
and exercise your own trade, and I will prosper your 
industry, and " give unto them a piece of money for me 
and thee." When some told him the news, that Pilate 
had killed some Galileans, and " mingled their blood 
with their sacrifices," he took occasion to dissuade them 
from rash judging, and taught them the necessity of liv- 
ing in habits of repentance, and in a most familiar man- 
ner confirmed this by telling them a sad event that lately 
fell out at the tower of Siloam. W^e call this the art of 
conversing like a Christian, when without any force, 
without. any rudenesg and impertinence, people take oc- 



MAY TEACH IT. 3£9 

casion in a natural, easy manner, to give conversation an 
edifying turn. The lips of some men are '• sweeter 
than honey and the honey-comb, pleasant to the soul, and 
health to the bones/' We could sit all the live-long 
day to hear such conversation, and like the disciples, we 
should say one to another, '' Did not our heart burn 
within us while they talked with us, and while they 
opened to us the Scriptures?" A fund of religious 
knowledge is necessary to this method of teaching 
Christianity, for it is "the heart of the wise," that 
" teacheth his mouth, and addeth even learning to his 
lips. Understanding is a well-spring of life unto him 
that hath it : but the instruction of fools is nothing but 
folly." What a number of motives enforce this duty ! 
If any Christian among you aspires to possess the hearts 
of his fellow Christians, and to form an eternal friend- 
ship, cemented by a necessity of love, let him try to ex- 
cel in this heavenly art. Behold the picture of such a 
man : " When I went through the city, and prepared 
my seat, the young and the aged arose and stood up, 
princes refrained talking, nobles held their peace. 
When the ear heard me, then it blessed me, and when 
the eye saw me, it gave witness to me : the blessing of 
him that was ready to perish came upon me, and I 
caused the widow's heart to sing for joy." To live thus 
amidst the convictions and affections of wise aad good 
people, is like living in an eastern spice grove : and 
what is the price, what the qualification for all this ? 
" I was as eyes to the blind, and feet to the lame ; I 
was a father to the poor, and the cause which I knew 
not, I searched out ;" and therefore, '' when my speech 
dropped upon them, they waited for me as for the rain ; 
I sat as the comforter of mourners." This is not mere- 
ly a description of a wise and upright judge, but of 
every wise and good man, who administers information 
and relief to people about him. 

A third way of teaching religion is by conference. 
We all have leisure time, and it is well spent when it 
is employed in set conferences on religion. There the 
doubting man may open all his suspicions, and confirm- 
ed Christians will strengthen his belief. There thft 
28* 



330 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

fearful may learn to be " valiant for the truth." There 
''the liberal" may learn to "devise liberal things." 
There " the tongue of the stammerer" may learn to 
" speak plainly." There Paul may " withstand Peter 
to the face, because he deserves to be blamed." 
There " the Gospel" may be " communicated severally 
to them of reputation." There, in one word, " ye may 
all prophesy one by one, that all may learn, and all 
may be comforted." One hour in a week, spent thus, 
will contribute much to your edification, provided you 
abstain from the disorders, that have often disgraced, 
and sometimes destroyed this excellent Christian prac- 
tice. Time should be kept, order should be preserved, 
no idle questions should be asked, freedom of inquiry 
should be nourished, immoderate forwardness should be 
restrained, practical, experimental, and substantial sub- 
jects should be examined, charity with all its gentle 
train should be there ; " she openeth her mouth with 
wisdom, and her tongue is the law of kindness." 

Finally, you have a right, if you have ability and op- 
portunity to teach publicly. We shall speak of the 
right presently : now let us observe ability and oppor- 
tunity. It is needless to repeat what we have all along 
been inculcating, the necessity of understanding the 
Gospel, before we attempt to teach it: but when it is 
understood, there wants only one qualification more, and' 
that is courage to utter what we understand. When a 
Christian prays, he should be bold, because God is mer- 
ciful : but he should be modest, because '' God is in hea- 
ven," a. high and holy being, and *' he upon earth," a 
sinful and imperfect man. In like manner, in address- 
ing our fellow-creatures, we should be bold, because the 
Gospel we teach is true ; and we should be modest, be- 
cause w^hen truths are taught by fallible men, they are 
always taught imperfectly. The ability we mean is at 
&h equal distance from arrogance and slavish fear : it is 
what the apostle Paul calls " openness," or great '' plain- 
ness of speech." This ability, made up of '' knowledge 
and utterance," hath a certain proportion adapted to 
particular places ; and that, which is equal to all the 
purposes of instruction in a small and obscure congre- 



MAY TEACH IT. 351 

gation, may be very unequal to the edification of a large 
and better instructed assembly : but as there are vari- 
ous assemblies of Christians in various circumstances, 
the part of a discreet man is to weigh circumstances 
and abilities together, and so to give them all their 
" portion of meat in due season." The apostles were 
" faithful and wise stewards," equal to all kinds of in- 
struction, in all places, at all times, and therefore them 
their " Lord made rulers over" all " his household." 
By opportunity, I mean convenience of place, time, and 
circumstances ; and when we affirm, whoever under- 
stands Christianity may teach it, we mean at fit times, 
in proper places, and in suitable circumstances ; for all 
which there are no certain rules ; but " wisdom is pro- 
^fitable to direct. All things are lawful, but all things 
are not expedient : all things are lawful for me, but I 
will not be brought under the power of any." All me- 
thods of teaching must be enforced by example, and 
without example all instruction is vain, if not wicked 
and dangerous. 

Let us finish by confirming the right of such teach- 
ers, as we have been describing, to exercise their abil- 
ities to the edification of the church. By right, I mean 
justice, not power. There is nothing wrong, but it is 
just and right for Christians, who understand their own 
religion, to teach it to others ; but all Christians are not 
in a condition to claim this right, and to give their 
claim validity and effect. This article must be first ex- 
plained, and then confirmed. 

I said a right. To what? To teach, not to domni- 
neer, and play the lord and master with insolence, and 
without control. Teaching naturally gives a man in- 
fluence ; but the moment his influence becomes a snare 
to himself, it becomes a misfortune to his brethren, and 
they will be under the painful necessity of teaching him 
to make a distinction, which he formerly made, when 
he was a hearer, but which his vanity hath made him 
forget now he is teacher. Doth he teach ? Very well. 
Do you disapprove of any thing he says? That is not 
the sin against the Holy Ghost ; but in his eyes it is the 
unpardonable sin. It is not enough that you hear hinij 



332 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

you must believe all he says, and must confound the 
modest " teacher of good things" with that haughty hea- 
then, called a dictator. The glory of the Psalmist will 
be your shame, and wo will be to him that saith, " I 
have more understanding than my teacher." When a 
church chooses a master over conscience, the members 
act wickedly ; but when they choose a poor master 
they act weakly ; for they, who have been mean enough 
to set masters over their own consciences, have been, 
however, wise enough in their generation to choose a 
pay-master ; but where nothing is gained, and every 
thing hazarded, what but folly in its last stage can tempt 
Christians to bear a lord over understanding and con- 
science ? Can any thing be so wretched as to engage 
to think always through life as our teachers think ; or, 
if we judge otherwise, to act against our own conviction 
for quiet sake ? Hear our apostle : " Ye may all pro- 
phesy : but the spirits of the prophets are subject to the 
prophets. Let the prophets speak two or three, and 
let the other judge. Let the women keep silence in 
the churches : but let them ask their husbands at home." 
Let " him that occupieth the room of the unlearned," 
not " say, x\men," till " he understandeth what thou say- 
est ;" for though " thou givest thanks well, yet he is not 
edified. What ! came the word of God out from you," 
Corinthians? the Jews have a right to dictate before 
you. " Came the word of God unto you only ! If any 
man be ignorant," after all these cautions, " let him be 
ignorant;" his ignorance is wilful and incurable. 

We said a right. To what ? To teach, not to make 
a fortune. " The workman is worthy of his meat," and 
it is a law of justice that " they who preach the Gospel, 
should live of the Gospel." It is easy to determine 
how the first teachers of Christianity " lived of the Gos- 
pel," by the virtues prescribed to them. They were 
men " not given to wine, not greedy of filthy lucre :" 
but they kept '' house," were •' husbands of one wife," 
had " children," and were " given to hospitality." The 
apostle Paul, referring to the passage just now mention- 
ed, saith, " So hath the Lord ordained that they who 
preach the Gospel, should live of the Gospel ;" and he 



MAY TEACH IT. 333 

wrges the reasonableness of the appointment from the 
law, and the nature of the case, as well as from the ex- 
press institution of Jesus Christ : '' but," adds he, " I 
have used none of these things." This was one of the 
things, which he thought '^ lawful, but," in his circum- 
stances, " not expedient." He was a " single" man, he 
lived a travelling life, was '•' in journeying often," and 
had " no certain dwelling-place ;" he lived an abstemi- 
ous life, " kept under his body," and therefore a little 
served him ; and what was more than ail, he had a great 
and generous soul, and thought himself richly rewarded 
by making " the Gospel of Christ without charge ;" be- 
side he loved liberty, and liberty loves independence^ 
No doubt, he enjoyed himself at Corinth, where he 
lodged at the house of Aquila, a tent-maker, wrought 
with his host at the same craft, and " reasoned in the 
synagogue every Sabbath day." Teaching, therefore, 
gives a right to support ; but circumstances determine 
the expediency of accepting it. If any man considers 
teaching as a trade to acquire wealth, he renders his 
virtue doubtful ; and if he exercises this trade with this 
view in our poor churches, he does no more honour to 
his understanding than to his heart. 

I said a right. To what ? To teach, and not merely 
to talk. To till up an hour, to kill time, to sound much 
and say nothing, to use vain repetitions, how easy are 
these to some men ! To teach is to inform, and to im- 
press. To inform the understanding by opening and 
explaining the Holy Scriptures, and by saying some- 
thing worth hearing, is one chief branch of instruction. 
The other is to impress, and set home information upon 
the heart, that it may abide there, and bring forth the 
fruit of a holy life. Every emotion of the heart should be 
pressed into the service of religion ; and there is in the 
Christian religion a great choice of subjects, and of me- 
thods of teaching them adapted to fancy and fear, to 
kindle a sacred, and to quench a profane flame in the 
heart. 

I said a right. To what ? To teach, and not to tat- 
tle. Teaching the Gospel gives a man no right to in- 
terfere in the secular affairs of his brethren. He has 



334 AJTi' PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

nothing to do, as a teacher, with their families, their 
businesses, and their several employments in life. 
There cannot be a more mischievous animal in a Christ- 
ian society, than a retailer of news, and tales, and slan- 
der, and solemn saws about the damnable sin of heresy, 
and the wonderment of an " old wife's fable." Far be 
it from us to plead the cause of such a man : " Let Baal 
plead for himself." Were we inclined to establish a 
right to do such wrongs, we would not introduce such a 
character under the notion of a teacher of religion, but 
under that of " a false witness that speaketh lies," a 
man " that soweth discord among brethren." 

When we say. Whoever understands Christianity hath 
a right to teach it, we do not say he hath a right to be 
heard ; for as one man hath a right to teach, so another 
hath a right to hear, or not to hear, as he thinks prop- 
er ; and the first ought not to exercise his right over 
the last without his consent. Sum up these articles, and 
they amount to this. Any person, who understands 
Christianity, may teach it : but his teaching gives him 
no right to assume the character of a rule over the con- 
sciences, or propert}'- of his brethren, no right to trifle 
with their precious time, to interfere in their worldly 
affairs, to oblige any to hear without their consent, or un- 
der any pretence whatever to introduce disorder and 
inequality into a family, where " one is the master, 
even Christ, and all" the rest, without excepting one, 
all the rest " are brethren," and where the highest en- 
dowments can make them no more. 

Let us not mistake this article ; teachers are not only 
brethren to one another, they are so to all the rest of 
the disciples of Christ. They have a right in common 
with other good men to be called the " salt of the earth," 
the '' lights of the world," and so on : but they have no 
right to inclose such passages for their own use, and to 
forbid other Christians to enter ; for this would change 
the character of teacher into that of engrosser. Much 
less have they, or any other Christians, a right to deck 
themselves with titles given to the Apostles, call them- 
selves ambassadors for Christ, whose persons are to be 
held sacred, and who say, they '' are set for the defence 



maV teach it. 335 

of the Gospel," and whose decisions are of so much con- 
sequence, that " whatsoever they bind on earth shall 
be bound in heaven," and " whatsoever they loose 
on earth shall be loosed in heaven." Christians have 
one Lord, whose " work is honourable and glorious," 
who " sent redemption unto his people," who " com- 
manded his covenant forever ; holy and reverend is his 
name." 

Having explained this right, it remains only that we! 
confirm it. Should a teacher of Christianity assume a 
right to himself, to the exclusion of his brethren, and 
should he pretend to teach you, and to justify his claim 
by ever so many instruments of paper, parchment, or 
steel, it would be a very sufficient, though a very short 
answer for every Christian to assign ; — you have not re- 
ceived such a right from me, and no other person in 
the world could possibly give you such a right over me 
but myself 

To be more explicit. The right of Patriarchs to 
teach their families hath no place here, except within 
the walls of a man's own house : for Christians are 
*' born not of blood, but of God." The church of Christ 
is made up of " one of a city and two Of a family : there 
indeed "is Benjamin and Judah," but Inhere also are 
" Rahab and Babylon, Philistia and Tyr^, Ethiopians, 
Barbarians, Scythians, bond and free. Ther^ is" abso- 
lutely '' no difference between the Jew and the Greek." 
There men say, '^ How beautiful are the feet of" Jews 
or Greeks, barbarians or Scythians, " that preach the 
Gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things." 

The right of conquerors to dictate to slaves, of gen- 
erals to harangue their armies, of Demetrius to make 
speeches to his fellow-craftsmen, have no place in a 
church, the members of which are not united by maxims 
of war or trade, being " born not of the will of the flesh 
but of God." Every society should be nourished and 
cherished by the same maxims by which it was consti- 
tuted ; but the Christian Church was formed on pure 
principles of their own conviction and consent. 

The right of ruling in civil governments hath no 
place in the Christian Church, for the Christian church 



336 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS CHRISTIANITY, 

is a creature, "not of the will of man, but of God." 
Civil states are creatures of reason, and men may form 
what government they think proper: but the church of 
Christ hath no such licence ; it is a creature of Revela- 
tion, and constituted under the express direction of Je- 
sus Christ : it is •' not of the will of man, but of God," 
and it is composed of men, to whom " he gave right, 
power, and privilege to become the sons of God." 

The right of inspired men hath no place here. What 
am I saying ? All the powers of working miracles, fore- 
telling future events, speaking with divers tongues, none 
of all these powers gave their owners an exclusive 
claim to teach, for he, who saith, " I thank my God, I 
speak with more tongues than you all," yet adds, much 
to his honour, " Brethren, be not children in understand- 
ing, ye may all prophesy one by one, that all," and I 
among the rest, " may learn, and may be comforted." 
All the instructions of these men run in the soft style of 
beseeching and persuading, and Paul not only reasoned 
with Felix, a man of rank, but he reasoned also with 
his brethren, and where his reasoning did not succeed 
with a plain Christian, he sat down content : " I greatly 
desired Apollos to come unto you, but his will was not 
at all to come at this time, but he will come when he 
shall have convenient time." If men of such extraor- 
dinary endowments founded on them no claim to teach, 
to the exclusion of their brethren, is it not abominable, 
that an ordinary Christian should found such a claim on 
the glorious pretence that he can read the history of 
the Gospels in two languages, whereas you can read it 
but in one ! Tell such a man, that the Gospel is a set 
of facts, of which you are as able to judge, as you are 
when you execute the office of jurymen in a court of 
law, and a cause is tried in your hearing. Tell him, 
evidence of the truth of the facts doth not depend on a 
frivolous attention to single terms, but on a general 
view of the whole put together, and it is indiiferent in 
what language information is conveyed, if it be convey- 
ed at all. Tell him, a Christian life is nothing but an 
effect of believing the great facts reported in the four 
Gospels. Tell him, you consider a good teacher as 



MAY TEACH IT- 337 

counsel on the side of truth, and a false teacher as the 
" orator Tertullus, who informed the governor against 
Paul ;" with this difference, Tertullus accused Paul to 
his face when he was present to reply, but false teach- 
ers bring charges against him, now he is dead, which 
were never thought of during his life. Assure him, you 
respect learning, admire oratory, think him a very in- 
genious man, but, as you neither envy his habit, nor de- 
sire his fees, your attention is more taken up with truth 
than with an elegant and handsome way of telling it;^ 
and that this is a truth which meets your conviction and 
approbation, " You may all prophesy one by one, that 
all may learn, and all may be comforted." 

We have all along taken the word prophesy in our 
text, for teach ; and this seems so clear, both in the text 
and in the whole chapter, that it cannot be doubted. 
To prophesy in the sense of our apostle, is " to inter- 
pret Scripture." Ye may all prophesy, that all may 
learn : what, may all foretell future events, that all 
their hearers may learn to foretell future events ? No 
■such thing ; but you may all interpret Scripture, that 
all may learn to interpret Scripture, and all be comfort- 
ed by understanding it. The whole chapter is easy in 
this light, and it is quite plain t3iat the scope and design 
of the apostle was to regulate the use of extraordinary 
gifts so as not to prevent the interpretation of Scrip 
ture ; " Covet to interpret Scripture, and forbid not to 
speak with tongues. Let all things be done decently 
and in order." 

The apostle founds the right of all Christians to teach, 
on three principles. The one is the authority of God : 
^' The things that I write unto you are the command- 
ments of the Lord." Nothing need be added to this : 
but as we have not always that reverence for the au- 
thority of the Lord, which we ought to have, the apos- 
tle urges the right of all Christians in our text, and in 
several other verses: a right to interpret Scripture 
themselves, and a right to judge of the interpretations 
of others. In the twelfth chapter (for this subject 
takes up three chapters of this Epistle), he likens the 
church to a human body, and shows the hono«r due to 
29 



338 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTAT^DS CHRISTIANITY, 

the " less honourable and more feeble" parts ; " by one 
spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be 
Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free, and have 
all been made to drink into one spirit." The third rea- 
son is taken from the nature of interpreting Scripture, 
and its use in the church. He makes a list of gifts be- 
stowed by " one and the self-same spirit." He weighs 
each in a just balance, estimates it by its usefulness, and 
comes to the conclusion ; " Greater is he that prophesi- 
eth than he that speaketh with the tongues, except he 
interpret, that the church may receive edifying." All 
may interpret Scripture : but do all interpret ? No. 
Why not? It is because some of you are so vain of dis- 
playing your gifts of tongues for your own glory, that 
you leave no room for others to exercise their ability 
in interpreting Scripture for the public edification. One 
of you " speaketh in an unknown tongue :" very well, 
you " speak mysteries, not unto men, but unto God ;" 
you " edify yourself," but " no man understandeth you :" 
but " he that prophesieth, speaketh unto men to edifi- 
cation, and exhortation, and comfort :" he edifieth the 
church. For my part, " I had rather speak five words 
to teach others, than ten thousand words in an unknown 
tongue. Brethren, be not children in understanding : 
howbeit, in malice, be ye children ; but in understanding 
be men." 

In one word, the primitive church met in public as 
we meet in conference, and giving instruction was open 
to all. How far it is prudent to revive this primitive 
discipline, circumstances only can determine. This, 
however, we venture to affirm, that any person, who 
understands the whole of religion, may teach the whole, 
and that he, who understands only a part, may teach 
that part, by a right of original charter from the Lord, 
by birthright as a Christian, and by right as a man to 
contribute to the edification of the church and the good 
of society : and I do think if Christians in general had 
the spirit to claim this right, they would have the pru- 
dence to prepare for the exercise of it by a diligent 
study of the Scriptures themselves ; and they would not 
consign as they now do the keeping of the whole Gos- 



MAY TEACH IT. 339 

-pel, both doctrine and ordinances, to one single man, 
*^ whose breath is in his nostrils," and all whose 
" thoughts perish in that very day" when " his breath 
goeth forth and he returneth to his earth." The fatal 
consequences of placing so much confidence in guides 
have been felt by a great number of Christian church- 
es. During their lives it is the sound sleep of free in- 
quiry, and at their deaths it is not unfrequently the dis- 
solution of a whole assembly. The Lord saith, '■'- Cease 
from man whose breath is in his nostrils ; for wherein 
is he to be accounted of?" But what do we say? 
When a teacher dies, we assemble the people, lament 
the loss, magnify the man, and, to comfort the church, 
preach from such a text as this, " Elisha died, and the 
Moabites invaded the land at the coming in of the year :" 
that is, while Elisha lived your doctrines and ordinances 
were safe, and if the enemy attacked you, he defended 
you : but now Elisha is dead, errors will invade the 
church, and none but a future Elisha can preserve you ? 
What is this but to keep Christians in a perpetual state 
of infancy ? How different is this from the spirit of 
him who said, " Would to God, that all the Lord's peo- 
ple were prophets !" How different from the language 
of one of the ^' friends of the bridegroom," who free 
from envy, said, " He must increase, but I must de- 
crease ?" How unlike is this to the voice of him who 
said, " I bow my knees unto the Father of our Lord Je- 
sus Christ, that he would grant you to be filled with all 
the fulness of God !" How far from the spirit of the 
master of us all, who said, " Forbid not," in answer to 
John, who told him, " We forbad one," " Forbid not," 
forbid not one : "for he that is not against us, is for us." 
My brethren, what objection can any good man have 
against seeing poor plain people assemble, and inter- 
pret Scripture to one another ! A great blessing some- 
times attends it, for Christian knowledge soon shows it- 
self in practice, and the dress of the seedsman adds no- 
thing to the strength of the seed. The words of Christ 
are " spirit and life," and it is delightful to see how 
freely sometimes a little instruction grows. When our 
Lord had taught the woman of Samaria that he was the 



340 ANY PERSON, WHO UNDERSTANDS, &€. 

" Messiah," away she went, leaving her pitcher, to in- 
form the men of her ciiy. They presently came, and 
the Lord made this reflection to his disciples. Said he. 
It is a usual saying, that there are " four months" be- 
tween seed-time and harvest, and it is true ; but see 
what encouragement you have to scatter truth in the 
world. I only just now told one woman that I was the 
Christ ; she hath told others, and many of the Samari- 
tans have heard and believed. Here is seed-time and 
harvest together. ■•' Lift up your eyes, and look on the 
fields ;" see the Samaritans coming to hear me them- 
selves, the fields " are white already to harvest ; he 
that soweth, and he that reapethmay rejoice together." 
Thus is the prophecy fulfilled, " Behold, the days come, 
saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the 
reaper, and the treader of grapes, him that soweth seed ; 
and the mountains shall drop sweet wine, and all the 
hills shall melt," May God bless these instructions! 
To him be honour and glory forever. Amen. 



DISCOURSE XVII. 

NO HAN MAY PUNISH CHRISt's ENEMIES BUT HIMSELF. 

[AT LIJVTOJV.} 

ISAIAH Ixiii. 1 — 6. 

Who is this that comeih from Edom with dyed garments 
from Bozrah ? this that is glorious in his apparel^ trav- 
elling in the greatness oj his strength ? I that speak in 
righteousness <, mighty to save. Wherefore art thou red 
in thine apparel^ and thy garments like him that tread- 
eth in the wine fat ? I have trodden the wine-press 
I- alone^ and of the people there was none with me : for I 
will tread them in mine anger^ and trample them in my 
.fury^ and their blood shall be sprinkled upon my gar- 
ments^ and I will stain all my raiment. For the day of 
vengeance is in mine hearty and the year of my redeemed 
is come. And I looked., and there was none to help ; 
and I wondered that there was none to uphold : there- 
fore mine own arm brought salvation unto me., and my 
fury it upheld me. And I will tread down the people in 
mine anger., and make them drunk in my fury., and I 
will bring down their strength to the earth. 

All the time I have been reading the text, I have 
felt the happiness of my situation. How delicious it is 
to be a member of a Christian church that well under- 
stands the doctrine of religious liberty, where a man 
may think what he pleases, and speak what he thinks j 
where " the fear of man" that " bringeth a snare" is 
29* 



342 NO MAN MAY PUNISH CHRIST S»ENEM1E$ 

neither the law of the teacher, nor of the hearers ; 
where " my liberty of conscience is not judged by ano- 
ther man's conscience." Such a situation renders life 
delightful, and seems to me preferable to a station of 
slavery in the court of a prince. There complaisance 
says to a prince, " Happy are these thy servants !" And 
in such a court as that of Solomon, civility speaks truth : 
but it is not in the courts of princes in general, it is in 
the church of Christ, that true happiness, the happiness 
of being perfectly free is enjoyed. Where conscience 
and conference are free, the place is indiiferent, accom- 
dations are indiiferent, every thing else is indifferent, 
and the heart of each beholder exclaims, " How goodly 
are thy tents, O Jacob, and thy tabernacles, O Israel !" 
Thy " king shall be higher than Agag, and his kingdom 
shall be exalted. Blessed is he that blesseth thee, and 
cursed is he that curseth thee." 

I speak thus, because I am going to interpret the 
text, not in the sense usually received, of Christ ma- 
king atonement for sin ; but in what appears to me the 
true sense, Christ in the character of a Judge punishing 
the enemies of himself and his church. 

That the person spoken of by the prophet is Christ, 
cannot be doubted, for the prophecy is quoted in the 
New Testament, and applied to him. " The word of 
God was clothed in a vesture dipped in blood, and he 
treadeth the wine-press of the fierceness and wrath of 
Almighty God." Long after the death of Christ the 
apostle John applied this prophecy to a future event, 
and expressly says, in this character" He doth judge." 
It is of the day of judgment therefore, that we are to 
understand this prophecy, and to this all the prophec}^ 
agrees-; the glorious person is a conqueror, not a suf- 
ferer. The blood on his apparel, " staining his rai- 
ment," is the blood of enemies, not his own. It is he 
that " smites the nations," and ''- tramples them in his 
fury :" it is not God smiting him. It is like the day of 
judgment, " the year of his redeemed :" but it differs 
from the time of his death, which, though it was a day 
of vengeance to the Jews, was not the day of vengeance 
to Edomites, and to " all men both free and bond, both 



BUT HIMSELF. 343 

small and great," as this is said to be. He was " alone, 
and" there was " none to help :" he will be so at the 
day of judgment, for " the Father hath committed all 
judgment to the Son." If Jesus Christ is said by the 
prophet to " wonder" that '' there was none to help" 
him, it must be expounded by the circumstances of the 
Jews, who, though they were commanded to punish 
idolaters, yet often suffered them to escape, of which 
we have many instances in Scripture. The prophet 
then conveys reproof and instruction to his countrymen 
in the prophecy, and did as much as to say. You have 
been commanded to destroy idolatry, and to punish idol- 
aters : but you resemble Saul, who for base reasons 
spared Agag ; you like Ahab l6t men go, " whom God 
appointed to utter destruction ;" you make covenants 
with th€se people, swear by their idols, and incorporate 
their superstitions with the worship of a jealous God ; 
it might have been expected you would have acted oth- 
erwise ; but do not flatter yourselves, neither they nor 
you shall go unpunished, " mine own arm shall uphold 
me." The apostle John, who wrote after this econo- 
my of things was dissolved, takes no notice of this part 
of the prophecy : but on the contrary observes, that the 
judge was followed by ''armies in heaven upon white 
horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean," repre- 
sented in this manner to denote their innocence ; they 
had shed no human blood, they were " white and clean," 
and the judge was the only person whose " vesture 
w^as dipt in blood.'" 

Whatever you think of the text, you will allow the 
doctrine which I am going to teach, that is, that no man 
may punish Christ's enemies but himself Confine what 
I affirm to the subject of which I speak. By the ene- 
mies of Christ 1 mean mere enemies to Christianity, 
who ought not to be persecuted for being so ; for the 
" son of man came not to destroy men's lives, but to save 
them :" but we do not mean to say that Christian magis- 
trates ought not to punish such as are enemies to the 
just civil laws of society. In this case rigour to a few 
is mercy to a multitude : but if the consciences of Christ- 
ians were accountable to the magistrate, the few would 



344 NO MAN MAY PUNISH CHRISt's ENEMIES 

be sacrificed to the ignorance and folly of the multitude, 
who having no conscience or religion, have no interest 
in the protection of either. 

Let us then address ourselves to this subject, and ex- 
amine . . . who are Christ's enemies . . . why we must 
not punish them . . . and on the contrary what direc- 
tions we have to perform all kind offices to them. " God 
of peace, our lawgiver, our king, and our judge ! Look 
upon the city of our solemnities:" let our "eyes see 
Jerusalem a quiet habitation :" let us " not see a fierce 
people, a people of deeper speech than we can under- 
stand :" let us experience " wisdom and knowledge to 
be the stability of our times :" grant our '' bread to be 
given us," our " waters to be sure," and our "eyes to 
behold the king in his beauty !" Amen. 

Who are the enemies of Jesus Christ? It is a gen- 
eral law of reason and justice, that great crimes re- 
quire great proof, because reasons against committing 
them are so many, that it is supposed few men are ca- 
pable of committing them. The bulk of mankind work 
but their own destruction by ordinary sins, rendered fa- 
miliar by practice, and when men pass the usual bounds 
of sinning, even they who are no saints exclaim, " There 
was no such deed done nor seen from the day, that the 
children of Israel came up out of Egypt unto this day." 
Inattention, indolence, covetousness, and such like, are 
common : but enmity against Christ, as it is a great 
crime, so I am willing to hope it is a rare crime ; and 
the safest way is to suppose, no man can be so great a 
sinner, who doth not openly declare himself to be so. 
An enemy to Christ is an enemy to the pure religion of 
Christianity ; and though all other sins are inconsistent 
with the Christian religion, yet are they not direct op- 
positions against it, and men may be strangers to Christ, 
who are not, strictly speaking, enemies to him, though 
perhaps they would be so, did they know him. We do 
not, therefore, put in the first place the bulk of those, 
in this country who live in sin. Born in ignorance, 
misled by the example of their parents, never shown 
Christianity by their masters or tutors, mixed with a 
crowd in pursuit of honour, pleasure, or profit, seldom 



BUT hiMSELF. 345 

in a place of worship, nor even then hearing the pure 
religion of Jesus taught ; they are " strangers and for- 
eigners, without Christ, having no hope, and without 
God in the world." All these, to use an expression of 
an apostle, " are without," and " what have we to do to 
judge them ? Them that are without God judgeth." 
What a company, what a horrible company is this, 
Christians ! " Without are dogs, and sorcerers, and 
whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and who- 
soever loveth and makelh a lie." 

Neither do we call those enemies of Christ, who are 
open and avowed enemies to some modes, in which 
Christianity hath been disguised. That the Christian 
religion hath fallen into the hands of mercenary men, 
who for worldly purposes have disguised it with error 
and superstition, every novice will allow. The religion 
of Jesus hath been debased by both heathen errors, and 
Jewish ceremonies, which in this case cease to be lau- 
dable, and become low superstitions, what an apostle 
calls " weak and beggarly elements," beneath, far be- 
neath the dignity of such a religion as Jesus Christ 
taught. These habits of Aaron, and dreams of the hea- 
then school, set forth under the name of Jesus Christ, 
have been called the Christian religion itself: but these 
are no more the Christian religion than the " linen," 
the " napkin" about his head, and the " sweet spices" 
at the grave of Christ, were Christ himself. Should 
any be so weak, or so wicked, as to give these to the 
disciples of Christ, for Christ, and instead of the Scrip- 
tures, every disciple would weep, and if asked, " Why 
weepest thou?" might justly say to an angel, " Because, 
they have taken away my Lord, and I know not where 
they have laid him." No, such men are not enemies of 
Christ, they are his friends, our friends, and the friends 
of all mankind. '' Happy shall he be ! O daughter of 
Babylon, happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth" 
thine idols " against the stones !" 

Far be it from us, too, to call those the enemies of 
Christ, who doubt, dispute, and even deny what are 
usually called the great doctrines of Christianity. Did 
jiuch men deny Christ to be the Messiah ; did they deny 



346 NO MAN MAY PUNISH CHRIST's ENEMIES 

him to be a teacher sent from God ; did they deny the 
Gospels the honour of being a true history ; did they de- 
ny the Scriptures to be a perfect rule of faith and prac- 
tice ; did they deny the pure morality exemplified by 
Jesus Christ ; did they deny a future state of rewards 
and punishments ; we might exclaim, '^ This is a de- 
ceiver and an Antichrist. Look to yourselves. Bid 
him not God speed." But do these men deny any of 
these, and are not these the great pillars of the Christ- 
ian religion ? On the contrary, do they not call Christ 
*' Master and Lord," sacrifice everything to conscience, 
study the Holy Scriptures, and fall in with the train of 
those who " follow" Jesus Christ '■• in the regenera- 
tion ?" While the son of man saith, " When I sit in the 
throne of my glory, you also shall sit upon thrones," 
^0 we presume to dispute his goodness, and to doom 
such to persecution, or to hell ? While he opens his 
arms wide as the world, and saith, '' Every one that 
hath forsaken" worldly advantages " for my name's 
sake, shall receive an hundred fold ; and shall inherit 
everlasting life!" do you, rash servant 1 "murmur 
against the good man of the house, saying, Thou hast 
made them equal unto us ?" O hear his mild answer : 
" Friend, I do thee no wrong. I will give unto this 
last even as unto thee. Is it not lawful for me to do 
what I will with mine own ?" O most gentle and mer- 
ciful Saviour! who can find in his heart to murmur 
against thee for such goodness as this ! What then, an- 
gry Christians ! What is the crime of such servants of 
your master as these ? Do they judge for themselves? 
So do you. Do they interpret the Scriptures differently 
from you ? And do not you interpret the Scriptures dif- 
ferently from them ? And is not each of you in the ex- 
ercise of a right of a man and a Christian, for which he 
is accountable to none but his Lord ? Discontented ser- 
vant! Would you have your Saviour " dip his vesture 
in the blood" of these men ? Ah ! Let us learn our 
religion better. Let us not turn free inquiry, the glory 
of a man into his shame. Rather let us say to every 
such person, " Come in, thou blessed of the Lord ; where- 
fore standest thou without ?" Let us avoid the injustice 



BUT HIMSELF. 347 

©f those, who punish not for crimes in exercise, but in 
prospect, and which may never be committed, and ought 
not to be suspected without a cause. Let us despise 
the cruel policy of Pharaoh, who said, "Israel are 
mightier than we ; come on, let us deal wisely with 
them : iest they multiply, and it come to pass, that when 
there falleth oui any war, they join our enemies and 
fight against us :" as if injustice and cruelty made faith- 
ful friends. 

Truth obliges us to make one distinction more be- 
tween our enemies and the enemies of Jesus Christ. 
In this frail state " it must needs be that offences come." 
It may happen, alas ! how often doth it happen that 
" brother goeth to law with brother, and that before un- 
believers !" A case much to be lamented, and the more 
because such men have ideas of friendship so refined, 
that " a brother offended is harder to be won than a 
strong city : and their contentions are like the bars of a 
castle." A powerful reason why Christians should put 
up with a thousand slights and indignities, and even in- 
juries, rather than begin an enmity that may never end. 
How easy to catch this fire, how hard to quench it. 
Sometimes it is not in the power of all a man's reason 
and religion ; it is not in the power of all his friends ; 
it is not in the power of all the excellencies of the broth- 
er he dislikes ; it is not in the power of all the exam- 
ples and commands of Scripture, to root out this horrid 
antipathy. A man should tremble when such a monster 
attempts to invade his soul, rack his invention, and de- 
stroy his peace : he should do this for his own sake ; 
how much more should he do for the sake of example, 
and for the sake of his master in heaven ? How such a 
case will be settled at the last day, it is not for me to de- 
termine : but the law saith, " if ye forgive not men 
their trespasses, neither will you Father forgive your 
trespasses." When the heart is poisoned with enmity, 
the eye of the mind is damaged, the understanding rea- 
sons partially, and the angry man thinks Christ reasons 
as be does, and expects fire to fall upon his enemy as if 
he were an enemy of Christ, and both these men think 
so of each other. Let us judge more soberly. Let us 



•348 NO MAN MAV PUNISH CHRIST's ENEMIES 

believe, that men throug^h a thousand unhappy cause* 
may be enemies to us, and yet not enemies to Jesus 
Christ. Let us reason in this case as an apostle hath 
taught us in another. '' Is he the God of the Jews on- 
ly ? Is he not also of the Gentiles ? Yes, of the Gen- 
tiles also." Is he the God of James only ? Is he not 
also of John? Yes, of John also. I repeat it again, Je- 
sus Christ is such an honour to human nature, he de- 
serves so well of mankind, he is so perfectly all we can 
wish, he hath so many personal excellencies, and comes 
to us with so many strong recommendations, that I am 
loath to suspect my fellow-creatures of enmity against 
him, and in this case I would never yield without unde- 
niable proof. "Brightness of the Father's glory ! Ex- 
press image of his person ! First born of every crea- 
ture ! King of kings and Lord of lords!" What is 
there in thee to disgust mankind ! " Blessed is he who- 
soever shall not be oifended in thee !" 

1 call him an enemy of Christ, who openly or covert- 
ly resists the great end of his coming into the world, 
which was to set man free. A friend to slavery is an 
enemy, not only to the knowledge and practice of re- 
ligion, but to the noble principle on which all the 
Christian religion is founded ; and to deny this is to 
deny the ground of action. The Christian religion is 
built on freedom : God " freely by his grace" formed 
the plan; Jesus Christ had power to "lay down his 
life," or not to lay it down ; " no man took it from 
him," but he laid it down of himself, and said, " Lo, 
I come to do thy will, O God :" " he that is called" to be 
a Christian " is the Lord's free man :" when Christ or- 
dained the apostles to their office, he said, " Freely you 
have received, freely give ;" and since he ascended to 
heaven, he commanded all his churches to " say. Come, 
and let him that is athirst, come, and whosoever will, 
let him take the water of life freely." A foe to free- 
dom therefore is an enemy to Christ, who, amidst a 
thousand titles that adorn him, shines in heaven most 
gloriously under that of a redeemer, " ten thousand 
times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands," bless- 
ing him for " redeeming them to God by his blood." 



BUT HIMSELF. 349 

OuF Lord in his parable of the talents speaks of three 
sorts of men. The first improve their talents ; they 
are good men and arc rewarded. The second hide 
their talents; they are unprofitable men in the church, 
and are punished. The third are " citizens," who '^ hate 
him," and " send a message after him, saying-, We will 
not have this man to reign over us." When the Lord 
hath reckoned with his servants, he gives a direction 
concerning these ; " But those mine enemies which 
would not that I should reign over them, bring hither 
and slay them before me." 

In this unworthy class we put all persecutors, Jews 
or Christians, who, knowing the Gospel to be a release 
of slaves, hate it on that account. The doctrine of 
Christ is calculated to unfetter the mind, the motives 
of the Gospel to loose the heart from shackles, and the 
duties of it to free the conduct both from gross sins, and 
human traditions. Persecutors, who aim at none of 
these advantages for themselves, refuse others the lib- 
erty of enjoying them, and to justify the procedure, send 
out many a message after the Gospel, the truth of which 
is. This man shall reign neither over us nor you. The 
errand of the messenger of a prince is a tale about sedi- 
tion, that of a priest, concerning heresy ; and he who 
can say nothing else cries, " Ye are idle, ye are idle, 
therefore ye say. Let us go, and do sacrifice to the Lord ;" 
and every task master can say this. Such is the world 
in which we live, that numbers have an interest in 
keeping mankind in bondage. Without this what would 
become of absolute monarchs, blind guides, and all their 
wives, families, and dependents ? '^ Dig they cannot, 
to beg they are ashamed :" too indolent for the first, 
too proud for the last ; necessity obliges them to try 
to convince mankind that they are necessary to their 
happiness, and in some parts of the world their success 
is equal to their wishes. Amidst their glory and tri- 
umphs there is one object enough to fill them with re- 
morse ; '' the souls of them that were slain for the word 
of God, and for the testimony which they held ;" and 
one appeal enough, if tyrants can tremble, to make the 
stoutest quake ; these souls " cry with a loud voice, 
30 



350 NO MAN WAY PUNISH CHRISTY'S ENEMIES 

How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not avengo 
our blood on them that dwell on the earth ?" 

In the same black list we put bigots, men whose blind 
zeal turns the opinions of a part into a confederacy 
against the freedom of all, and so makes the Prince of 
peace the head of a faction. These differ from the for- 
mer in that they claim the liberty of being Christians 
for themselves ; but they agree with them in denying 
the same liberty to others. They agree with good men 
in that they hold religion firm and fast ; but they differ 
from them in refusing others the same attachment to 
what they count religion. They differ from both per- 
secutors and pious men, in that they resist Christ igno- 
rantly ; at least charity makes us hope so, though ap- 
pearances are much against them. How can they read 
the New Testament, how can they justify Christ and 
his apostles, how can they account for their own con- 
duct, how can they be deaf to the cries of the oppress- 
ed, how can they avoid hearing the just claims of such 
as require nothing but their birthright ? They say, 
they cannot see equal and universal liberty to be a 
right either of reason, conscience, or religion. We 
give them credit : but " how can these things be ?" 
Each satisfies himself by saying, It is not I. It was the 
woman, said our first father. It was the serpent, said 
the woman. It was all of you, said the Judge. The 
ground is cursed for your sake. 

To these two we add libertines, who are enemies to 
all the morality of Jesus Christ, and who, knowing the 
Christian religion to be a holy religion, hate it on that 
account. Against piety they oppose unbelief and con- 
tempt of God. Against universal love they declare a 
general war, now against the character, then against the 
property, and then against the peace and well being of 
society : enemies alike to every thing good ; to day 
against the state, to-morrow against the church, the 
third day against an individual, and every day against 
some great law of nature, exemplified by Jesus Christ, 
and by him enforced on all his disciples. Instead of 
obeying the Christian laws of temperance, chastity, so- 
bermindedness, and conscience, they live upon sin. 



BUT HIMSELF. 351 

drink poison every day, and wonder at fourscore that 
man must die. All these we have a right to call ene- 
mies to Jesus Christ. Tlie guilt of some is greater 
than that of others ; but the least degree of enmity 
against such a person, and such a religion, is a high de- 
gree of turpitude and guilt. The tirst hate the spirit 
and doctrine of Christ ; the second detest his example ; 
the third resist his laws ; and all " abhor judgment, and 
pervert all equity," and say, '' None evil can come upon 
us." Yes, evil will come upon you : not from us, from 
us you have nothing to fear : but " who is this that 
Cometh from Edom ? This that is glorious in his ap- 
parel, travelling in the greatness of his strength ?" It 
is your mighty Judge, who says, " To me belongeth 
vengeance and recompense ; your feet shall slide in due 
time." 

Christians, the prospect of this day, so terrible, and 
yet so necessary, hath excited in you many fears and 
tears on your own account, and your charity will cause 
you to shed many a friendly tear for others, to whom 
the Prophet saith, " Give glory to the Lord your God, 
before he cause darkness, and before your feet stumble 
upon the dark rnountains : but if ye will not hear, my 
soul shall weep in secret places for your pride." This 
is the disposition of a good man ; and, though " the 
wicked gnasheth upon him with his teeth, yet he seeth 
that his day is coming," and weeps in secret places for 
his pride and all its fatal consequences. No, he doth 
not persecute : he doth not pretend with bigots to have 
the sole power or privilege of escaping the wrath to 
come; he doth not, like an abandoned profligate em- 
bolden men to sin by his own example ; but he weeps 
in secret places, and when he hath opportunity asks a 
question, which the whole world can never answer, 
" Wherefore doth the wicked contemn God ?" 

Such conduct is founded on justice, and out of many 
reasons I will select a few to show you why the righ- 
teous must not punish the wicked for their enmity against 
Christ, and by these to confirm you in that peaceable 
deportment, which doth you so much honour. 

First, we hjive no authority. Authority includes two 



552 NO MAN MAY PUNISH CHRIST's ENEMIES 

things, power and law ; legal power, power founded en 
right : now Christians have no such authority ; and that 
may be said to every one, which our Lord said to Pilate, 
" Thou couldest have no power at all against me, ex- 
cept it were given thee from above." There are only 
two possible sources of authority in m.alters of religion: 
our Lord mentions both in a case not unlike this before 
us. He was teaching in the temple. A committee of 
priests and elders waited on him to ask, " By what au- 
thority doest thou these things ?" Jesus answered this 
question by another. He knew they had formerly waited 
on John the Baptist with the same question, and had re- 
ceived a clear, satisfactory answer, and j^et persisted in 
opposing both John and himself He therefore refer- 
red them to that transaction by asking them, " The bap- 
tism of John, whence was it, from heaven or of men?" 
These are the only two sources of authority. In the 
case before us, if you punish the enemies of Christ, and 
be asked, by what authority you do this ? you cannot 
say, " Of men," because though persecutors have settled 
on themselves a right to oppress others, yet they have 
not given others a right to punish them. There is in 
fact no such right in being, for it would make an odd 
compound to give such an answer to an inquirer as this. 
He asks, The Christian religion, is it from heaven or of 
men ? And persecutors answer, The doctrine is from 
heaven: but the power to enforce it is "of m.en." 
No : humaa authority hath no more to do with the sup- 
port of Christianity than it had with the revelation of it. 
It remains then only to inquire whether a persecutor 
have his authority from heaven. " Call now," see " if 
there be any" inspired writer " that will answer thee," 
or " to which of the saints wilt thou turn ?" So far 
from empowering thee, they all hold thee in abhor- 
rence ; their dignitj^, their duty, their inclinations, their 
example??, tlieir writings all say, '' The wrath of man 
worketb act t'le righteousness of God. If ye have bit- 
ter envving and strife in 3^our hearts, glory not, and lie 
not agyinst the truth. This Avisdom descendeth not 
from above ; but is earthly, sensual, devilish. For 
where envying and strife is, there is confusion, and eve- 
ry evil work." 



BUT HIMSELF. 353 

As we have nO direct authority to persecute, so we 
have no prescription^ or rules authorized by custom. 
Read the Gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the whole 
scripture history of preaching the Gospel, planting 
churches, and regulating the lives of men, and see whe- 
ther you can find any rules to direct the practice of 
punishing the enemies of Christ. Had the Scripture 
said, A heretic of such a description you may laugh at; 
another of such a kind you may slander ; a third of such 
a sort you may plunder ; this order of persons you may 
banish, and that you may burn to death ; these were 
the constant customs of Jesus Christ and his Apostles: 
but, on the contrary, should a Moses say. Ye shall " not 
commit these abominable customs," and should an Apos- 
tle say, " We have no such custom, neither the church- 
es of God," as they may well be supposed to say, what 
could a persecutor reply ? The justice of punishment 
depends on the quantity of it : too little is not enough 
to express the end of punishing, and too much is more 
than the crime deserves. How delicate and dangerous 
is it for frail mortals to pretend to administer justice 
without direction from above ! When the prophet Eli- 
sha was dying, the king of Israel paid him a visit, wept 
over him, called him Father, and said, " The chariot of 
Israel and the horsemen thereof," flattering the Pro- 
phet, that he was the strength and defence of the coun- 
try. The man of God, to convince the king that he 
had strength enough to do his duty, if he had a heart to 
make use of it, directed him to shoot an arrow, and 
smite upon the ground, in token of attacking the Syri- 
ans, who had wasted his country. The king " smote 
thrice and stayed." Oh, said the man of God, " thou 
shouldst have smitten five or six times," thou dost but 
half enter into the spirit of thy duty, thou dost but half 
love thy country : it is not me, but an entire love of our 
country, that is " the chariot of Israel and the horsemen 
thereof;" well, "thou shalt smite Syria but thrice," 
and some future prince shall have the honour of finish- 
ing what thou hast a spirit only to begin. While the 
Prophet " put his hands upon the king's hands,"^nd 
said, " Open the window and shoot eastward," the king's 
. 30* 



354 XO >fAX MAY PUNISH CHRIST S EXEMILS 

heart was enlar2:ed, and liis views carried forward t^^ 
the extent ol' his duty : but the moment the Prophet 
left him to himself, he fell short. Happy for us, when 
we act in all cases under the direction of our Divine 
Prophet ! In the present case, presuming to act with- 
out direction, we shall give little punishment to whom 
much, and much to whom little is due. 

Christians do not persecute, because they know per- 
secution doth no good. To punish belbre the commis- 
sion of sin is a perversion of all justice. To punish af- 
ter it. is wise only -when pain is likely to reclaim the 
offender, or to deter others when the offender himself is 
become incorrigible, and so bad as to be beyond all 
means of amendment. ]^o enemy of Christ is in this 
last condition during the present life. As a king of Ju- 
dah was in one pari of his life an oppressor of his peo- 
ple, and imprisoned his reprovers in a rage : but Asa 
was recovered from his folly, destroyed idolatry, burnt 
the idol of his own mother, and retbrmed the worship 
of God ; and therefore on the whole is said to be " per- 
fect with the Lord all his days.'' Manasseh was a hard- 
ened cruel man, and " before he was humbled,** com- 
mitted maav great crimes against God, and even '••shed 
inaoceiit blood very much :*' yet '' when he was in af- 
fliction, he besought the Lord his God, and the Lord 
heard his supplication.** Adlictions from the hand of 
Providence humble men : but punishments from their 
fellow-creatures irritate and provoke them. ''• Behold, 
happy is the man whom God correcteth :** lor if ''• he 
maketh sore he bindeth up ;*" if " he woundeth, his 
hands make whole :** but when men oppress and punish 
one another, they are wicked, and "the tender mercies 
of the wicked are cruel.*' Well might David pray, 
" Let me not fall into the hands of man : let me fall in- 
to the hand of the Lord : for his mercies are very 
o-reat 1*' As persecution can never proceed on suppo- 
sition the persecuted are incorrigible, so neither can it 
he applied i^s a proper method of reformation. Can 
persecution inform the judgment ; can it change the 
heart? Let us then dethrone reason, destroy Scripture, 
divest the Holy Spirit of his othce, provide " weapoos.*' 



BUT IIIMSCLF. 356 

not spiritual, but '' carnal,'"' and " bring every thought 
to the obedience of Christ !" If nothing of this can be 
done, let us renounce this " hidden thing of dishonesty," 
and let us leave all such practices to the workers of in- 
iquity. 

Christians cannot persecute, because they are taught 
to " love their enemies," to " bless such as curse them," 
to " do good to those that hate them," and to " pray 
for all who despitefully use and persecute them." 
Such is the love of a good man to his master, that he 
cannot help saying, O Lord, " I count them that hate 
thee mine enemies." And what saith the Lord in an- 
swer to your sincere and consistent love of him ? He 
saith, Do not hate thine enemies : '' it hath been said, 
hate thine enemy ; but I say unto you, love your ene- 
mies." Love them, because there is , something lovely 
in the worst: love them, because your heavenly Fa- 
ther sets you an example : love them, because I com- 
mand you : love them, because they may be won by 
your love to become friends : love them because I loved 
you, when you was an enemy to me. This, my breth- 
ren, is reason and religion ; this is the " word behind 
thee, saj^ing, This is the way, walk ye in it." Let not 
this woixl be the less respected by us because it is a 
"still small voice," and doth nof come in wind, and 
earthquake, and lire, rending the mountains and sliver- 
ing the rocks! It is man, great man, mighty man, who 
in the " glory of his high looks," speaks thus, or affects 
to speak thus as well as he can 5 it is he, whose '' stout 
heart saith, 1 am prudent, I have removed the bound of 
the people, and have robbed their treasures, and I have 
put down the inhabitants like a valiant man." It is 
" Lucifer, the son of the morning, who saith, I will sit 
upon the mount of the congregation, 1 will be like the 
most high." I felt no more plundering a nation, than 
at spoiling a bird''s nest, for " there was none that moved 
the wing, or opened the mouth, or peeped." This is. 
the language of a tyrant in religion : this is not the 
Style of the just and gentle Jesus : he, the righteous 
judge, will indemnify the sufferers, and say to the ty- 
rant, " A lire shall consume the glory of both soul aii4 



3(56 NO MAN MAV PUxMSH CHRIST's ENEMll S 

body. Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed 
garments from Bozrah ?" 

Filially, the certainty of the day of judgment deters 
good men from persecuting. The wicked will not go 
unpunished. No class of bad men will escape. There, 
tyrants of every age, and of every description, must ap- 
pear, and answer a question like this, '• Whose ox, or 
whose ass hath he taken ?" '' Whom hath he de- 
frauded V " Whom hath he oppressed ?'' ''^ Of whose 
hand hath he received any bribe to blind his eyes there- 
with ?" Happ}' , infinitely happy the man, who can say, 
" The Lord is witness, and his anointed is witness, 
that you have not found aught in my hand ! I am pure 
from the blood of all men !" There, bigots shall ap- 
pear, and answer for their ignorance, injustice, and par- 
tiality. There, they will be required to answer ques- 
tions like these : *' Why have ye stolen the king away ? 
Why did you despise us, that our advice should not be 
had in bringing back our king ?'' Why did you " hate 
and cast out your brethren" in the name of God, " say- 
ing. Let the Lord be glorified ?"' Why did you " for- 
sake the right way, and follow the way of Balaam, who 
loved the wages of unrighteousness?" ^Vhy did you 
do worse than he, and curse whom the Lord h.tth bless- 
ed? There, the wicked of all sorts will be collected, 
and every individual will receive for the deeds done in 
the body. The Christian foresees all this, restrains his 
passions, bears long and is kind, and saith, as David of 
Saul, w hen a rash ftiend said, '^ Let me smite him, even 
once, and I will not smite him a second time." No, 
said David, " the Lord forbid! The Lord shall smite 
him. Either his day shall come to die, or he shall de- 
scend into battle and perish : but mine hand sh>ill not 
be upon him." He persecutes me, but '• the Lord be 
judge between him and me." Sentiments not of policy 
merel}'', but of humanity, justice, and religion. 

It is not enough not to persecute the enemies of 
Christ; we are bound b}^ every solemn tie to perform 
every dut}^ yea more, every kind office of friendship 
towai'ds them*. This is not only expressly commanded, 
*' If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give 



BUT HIMSELF. 367 

him drink : be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil 
with good :" I say these duties are not only command- 
ed, and lie in our books to be read; but they live in the 
examples of all good men in some degree, and of some 
good men in a very high degree. Of all examples, 
that of our heavenly Father is the brightest, and ought 
to have most weight with us. It v,'ill be so, if we en- 
ter into the spirit of the Christian religion, or feel what 
the apostle Paul calls the " the love of God shed abroad 
in our hearts :" a love commended towards us by the 
very principle we are inculcating. The apostle consid- 
ers mankind in three classes. In the iirst he puts right- 
eous men, who just perform what the law requires, and 
asks. Who will die to obtain a right of living for such a 
man ? Scarcely one ; for the life of such a man is of 
little use to society. In a second class he puts good 
men, who not only discharge all duties to society, but 
moreover abound in all kind offices, to which the}^ are 
not obliged, and which are the generous dictates of 
their own goodness. Peradventure (it is only perad- 
venture), some may know the worth of this man so well, 
and love society so much, that they would '' even dare 
to die," were it possible by dying in his stead to length- 
en a life so valuable. But here is a third class, neither 
good nor righteous, but sinners^ enemies. Who will 
die for them ? Who indeed ? '' But God commendeth 
his love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, 
when v/e were enemies, Christ died for us." When 
the love that did this is " shed abroad in cur hearts," 
w^-e have learnt the doctrine of the text, the conduct of 
a good man towards the enemies of Christ, which is not 
only to suspend anger, but to be '' full of mercy and 
good fruits." 

Let us not abuse this doctrine by applying it to other 
things beside religion. The enemies of Christ, subtle 
enough in their generation, have sometimes gone be- 
yond good men, and have been ''wiser than the child- 
ren of light." They have examined the peaceable 
principles of our holy religion, and ingeniously turned 
the doctrines of Christ to purposes of sin. Say they, 
You are forbidden to persecute, you must not resist us 



358 NO MAN MAY PUNISH CHRIST's ENEMIES 

when we persecute you. You are commanded to be 
humble, your religion forbids you to exercise civil offi- 
ces in a state. You are commanded to do all kind offi- 
ces to us, and we expect them at 3^our hands : your re- 
ligion requires you to set your hearts on the world to 
come, and the management of this world you should 
leave to us. There is here and there an honest sim- 
pleton, v/ho admits all this, and calmly suifers himself 
to be plundered of all his birthrigfit. A wise Christian 
makes a distinction between truth and the application 
of it; and when the truths of religion are applied to 
purposes of sin, cries Treason^ treason^ high treason 
against the majesty of the King of kings, against the se- 
curity of the Commonwealth, high treason to counter- 
feit the great seal of heaven. Suppose a thief should 
come in the night, break into your houses, steal your 
money, and with the bag in one hand, and the Gospel 
in the other, should awake you out of your sheep and 
read, Jesus said, " Lay up for yourselves treasures in 
heaven, for where your treasure is, there ^ill your 
heart be also ;" would you calmly turn and compose 
yourselves to sleep again, or would you rise and cry, 
Stop thief? A very little discernment is sufficient to 
convince us that mankind have natural and civil rights, 
and that, though it is wrong to punish mere enmity 
against the Christian religion, yet it is just to resist, and 
proper to punish open acts disturbing societ}'', and the 
order of good government. The magistrates of Philip- 
pi whipped and imprisoned Paul and Silas for teaching. 
Next day the}'' sent to the jailer, saying-, "Let those 
men go," and he advised them to accept the favour 
" and go in peace." No, said Paul, they have acted 
illegally, and they shall " come themselves and fetch us 
out." The same principles, that obliged us yesterday 
to teach the Gospel, bind us to day to maintain the hon- 
our of the law, for " the law is made for the lawless 
and disobedient." Human law is good or bad as it is 
used ; bad if applied to religion and conscience, and 
good if a man use it lawfully. 

The Christian religion is so far from preparing men 
to resign the benefits of society, that it is itself the best 



BUT HIMSELF. 359 

preparation for the enjoyment of them. It inculcates 
all the virtues of good citizens, and teaches a man both 
how to rule and how to obey ; " how to be full" as well as 
" how to be hungry ;" " how to abound" as well as " how 
to be abased ; how to do all things through Christ who 
strengtheneth him " V\'^hat is there in the offices of life, 
which religion disables a good man to do ? What is there 
that religion doth not enable him to do better ? A Christ- 
ian judge cannot take a bribe. Is justice likely to be per- 
verted on that account ? A Christian cannot perjure him- 
self Is it necessary to the good of society that an admin- 
istrator of justice should forswear himself; and is he a 
proper man to administer oaths to others ? A Christian 
is not a blasphemer, a drunkard, or an unclean person. 
But are impurity, blasphemy, and drunkenness necessa- 
ry to the offices of life ? A Christian is taught by his 
religion to " flee things which drown men in destruc- 
tion and perdition, and to follow after righteousness and 
godliness ;" and therefore his religion doth not send to 
deprive him of his natural birthrights, but, on the con- 
trary, prepares him to enjoy them all. If the adminis- 
tration of justice and order in the world be got into 
such channels, that a conscientious Christian cannot fol- 
low them, the more the pity. Our religion comes to 
our aid even in this case, and teaches us " therewith to 
be content." Mean while it calls ns, and all within 
hearing, to fix our eyes on a future day, and inquire, 
" Who is this that cometh from" punishing " Edom ?" 
Is he come to punish, or to reward me ? 

" Who is this that cometh to stain his garments with" 
human " blood ?" Is it any of you, tyrants of ancient 
history ? Is it Nimrod, Pharoah, Assyrian, " rod of 
God's anger," or you, Nebuchadnezzar, the " hammer 
of the whole earth," you proud ^' axes and saws," and 
sharp instruments of cruelt}'^, that " magnified yourselves 
against him that shook you" over a guilty world, in 
mercy to provoke them to be virtuous and free ; scourg- 
es of mankind ! Is it any of you ? No, your days had 
an end; the dead say of each of you, '-'• Art thou also be- 
come weak as we ?" And the living say, " Is this the 
man that made the earth to tremble ? that made the 



360 NO MAN MAY PUNISH CHRISt's ENEMIES 

world as a wilderness, an>l opened not the house of his 
prisoners ?" Men of this kind have often been clothed 
in vestures dipt in the blood of their fellow-creatures ; 
and for what niighty cause ? For a few acres of other 
men's land : for a vain title : for the " offence of a sin- 
gle word :" for a nothing. What future times may pro- 
duce, who can tell ? To what degree of wretchedness 
vice may reduce mankind, who can say ? No ancient 
shedder of human blood durst have carried his iniquity 
so far, had not luxury, debauchery, and poverty gone 
first to blind the miderstandings, and to tame mankind, 
who are naturally wild, savage, and not easily depress- 
ed and subdued. In this part of the world let us hope 
such a day far distant ; but let us never forget, that 
like causes produce the same effects, and that people 
broke loose may be brought back to bondage by the 
same methods which brought slavery tirst into the world. 
Terrible as a tyrant is, he is not a self-created monster ; 
slaves live first, and become the parents of all such. 
We should value the Christian religion, were it only 
considered in the light of a preservative from t3'^ranny : 
and had we no more Christianity than what the Sermon 
on the Mount contains, that would be a sufficient pre- 
ventive. " Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of 
thistles ?" 

" Who is this that cometh from Edom, with dyed gar- 
ments from Bozrah, trampling'' on men "• in his fury," 
and " sprinkling their blood upon his garments," and 
saying, '' The day of vengeance is in mine heart ?" Is 
it " Jannes or Jambres," who " withstood Moses," hard- 
ened Pharaoh, and taught him to persecute the He- 
brews for saying " Let us go and serve God ?" Is it 
Zedekiah, who struck a Prophet on the cheek, because 
he did not say as he said, exclaiming, " Which way 
went the spirit of the Lord from me to speak unto 
thee ;" he who flattered two kings, a whole court, and 
a fine army into swift destruction ? Is it Caiaphas, who 
insulted a whole board of privy counsellors, for delib- 
erating on the justice or injustice of an action, and not 
attending simply to the question of convenience ? Is it 
one of the " grievous wolves" that " arose after the de- 



BUT HIMSELF. 361 

parture" of the Apostles, not sparing the flock ? Is it 
" Diotrephes, who forbiddeth men to receive the Apos- 
tles, and casteth them out of the chuich ?" Is it the 
" mother of abominations" that " reigneth over the 
king's of the earth, drunken with the biood of the saints," 
and with " the blood of the martyrs of Jesus ?" Is it 
any oppressor of religion and conscience of ancient or 
modern times ? All are unjust and cruel : but there 
are degrees of injustice and cruelty, and the last are 
the worst. They in Egypt sinned against nature and 
reason. Those among the Jews sinned against an im- 
perfect revelation: but among Christians oppression 
of conscience is a crime of the deepest dye. This 
crime came into the Christian church not by princes, 
but by their own teachers, who, availing themselves of 
the respect in which public instruction was held, step- 
ped into the practice, called it an office of authority 
and power, altered instruction so as to make God plead 
for Baal, like death " put all things under their feet," 
and like death they will be the " last enemies that 
shall be destroyed ;" they in this world, death at the 
resurrection. The love of Christians to their teachers 
is just, their zeal for public instruction is right : but it 
ceaseth to be " a zeal according to knowledge," wlen 
it goeth so far as to put the judgments and consciences 
of Christians into their hands. If such projectors should 
*' look to you for help, and wonder that there is none to 
uphold" a single notion tending to give them the mas- 
tery ; if on the contrary, they should wonder to see you 
suspicious of teachers, and jealous of your liberty ; if 
they should be astonished that you turn your attention 
to such little things ; tell them, if you lose a single 
doctrine while you are free, you may find it again, but 
if you lose your freedom of inquiry, all is lost : tell 
them, that if the primitive church had not slept ov^r 
these articles, no enemy, however willing, could have 
sown tares : tell them you have profited by the mis- 
takes of others : tell them there is no heresy like that 
of dominion over conscience, which begins with anger 
and ends in a " vesture dipt in human blood." 

" Who is this that cometh from Edom, travelling ia 
31 



;362 NO MAN MAY FUiXlSIl CIIIUST S ENEMIES 

the greatness of his streng-th, to tread down the people 
in liis anger?" This, this is ^' Alexander the copper- 
smith," born in the church, a Christian by prejudice, a 
trustee for the house, become rich by trade, and now 
Alexander would be '' a lord over God's heritage 1" 
Poor man I And do you think that a people who have 
had the courage to resist the most powerful and dread- 
ful of mankind, who have '' gotten the victory over the 
beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over 
the number of his name," will ever have the meanness 
to submit their consciences to you ? Go, and enjoy 
your prosperity in the world ; but when you enter a 
Christian church, a place where " gold," and " silver," 
and " brass" in the "• purse," and " two coats," and a 
pair of " shoes" are objects of nobody's consideration, at 
least salute the house, and let the iirst word you say, be, 
" Peace be to this house." If you say nothing else, at 
least prepare to answer this reasonable question, " Com- 
est thou peaceably ?" and learn to reply, '' Peaceably : 
I am come to sacrifice unto the Lord, come with me to 
the sacrifice." 

God forbid, my brethren, any of us should set our- 
selves up for defenders of the cause of Christ, except 
by reason, argument, and example ! Every other me- 
thod is sinful, contrary to the spirit of our holy religion, 
conveying suspicion of its goodness, and offering an in- 
sult to its power. It resembles making pillars to hold 
up the heavens, and if it does not always imply a deprav- 
ed heart ; it does actually imply a weak, disordered 
head. Certainly it is just and right that sin should be 
punished 5 but to do this is a work assigned to Christ, 
as a part of his office as judge - of the world. Let us 
hear how the apostie John, and the whole Scripture 
expound the Prophet Isaiah. " Who is he that comelb 
from Edom ?" It is '<■ the word of God, called faithful 
and true." His title is, " King of kings, and Lord of 
lords." " Wherefore art thou red in thine apparel, and 
thy garments like him that treadeth in the wine vat V 
It is because he is obliged as " judge in righteousness 
to make war," and punish nations that rebel against Al- 
mighty God. Wherefore is " blood sprinkled upon 



BUT HIMSELF. 363 

thy garments?*' It is because the day of judgment will 
not, like other cahimities, spend its force on herbage 
and cattle, and spare guilty man, but come home to his 
own person, '' touch his bone and his flesh," and " hunt 
for the precious life." Wherefore is the " day of ven- 
geance in thine heart ?" It is because justice and vir- 
tue require it: because the wicked are past all amend- 
ment, and the righteous ought to be indemnified, 
'^ Wherefore art thou alone ?" . It is because I alone 
am equal to the task ; I only have wisdom, integrity, 
and firmness enough to execute a work so great. Where- 
fore "of the people" are ''there none with thee?" 
The people are not with me in office : but they are 
with me by their approbation of Divine justice, and 
" armies follow upon white horses." Wherefore is this 
day described by similitudes taken from woridl}^ con- 
querors with fury in their hearts, and " blood upon 
their garments ?" Because you are children io un- 
derstanding, and have always accustomed yourselves to 
tremble at and avoid such calamities as these. 

Methinks, Christians, I hear the Prophet say all this, 
and add in the language of another Prophet, " Thus 
will I do unto thee, and because I will do this unto thee, 
prepare to meet thy God." Yes, the day will come, 
the prophecy must be fulfilled, " heaven and earth 
shall pass away, but one jot or one tittle of the law and 
the prophets shall in no wise pass till all be fulfiried. 
Then every eye shall see him, and they also who pierced 
him, and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because 
of him." God grant you ma}^ all be prepared to '' meet 
him in the air, and so be forever with the Lord !" To 
him be honour and glory forever. Amen. 



MORNING EXERCISES 



31* 



EXERCISE I. 

INDUSTRY. 
l^T ST. IVES.] 



PSALM V. 3. 

My voice shalt thou hear in the mornings O Lord. In, 
the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee^ and will 
look up. 

Early rising is a habit so easily acquired, so necessa- 
ry to the despatch of country business, so advantageous 
to health, and so important to devotion, that, except in 
cases of necessity, it cannot be dispensed with by any 
prudent and diligent man. 

Thanks to the goodness of God, and the fostering 
hands of our kind parents, this habit is so formed in 
some of us, that we should think it a cruel punishment 
to be confined to our beds after the usual early hour. 
Let us prize and preserve this profitable practice ; and 
let us habituate all our children and servants to consid- 
er lying in bed after day-light as one of the ills of the 
aged and the sick, and not as an enjoyment to people in 
a state of perfect health. 

If any of us have been so unfortunate as to have ac- 
quired the idle habit of lying late in bed, let us get rid 
of it. Nothing is easier. A habit is nothing but a re- 
petition of single acts ; and bad habits are to be broke 
as they were formed, that is, by degrees. An incom- 
parable judge says, "• Habit, like a complex mathemati- 



368 MORNING EXEKCISES. 

cal scheme, flowed originally from a point, which in- 
sensibly became a line, which unfortunately became a 
curve, which finally became a difficulty not easily to be 
imravelled." This difficulty, however, may be unravel- 
led by application and prudence. Let a person accus- 
tomed to sleep till eight in the morning, rise the first 
week in April at a quarter before eight, the second 
week at half after seven, the third at a quarter after 
seven, and the fourth at seven : let him continue this 
method till the end of July, substracting one quarter of 
an hour each week from sleep, and he will accomplish 
the work, that at first sight appears so difficult. It is 
not a stride, it is a succession of short steps, that con- 
veys us from the foot to the top of a mountain. Early 
rising is a great gain of time ; and should the learner 
just now supposed, rise all the harvest month at four 
instead of eight, he would make that month equal to 
&we. weeks of his former indolent life. 

Country business cannot be despatched without early 
rising. In spring, summer, and autumn, the cool of the 
morning is the time both for the pleasure and the rid- 
dance of work ; and in the winter the stores of the year 
are to be prepared for sale, and carried to market. The 
crop of next year, too, is to be set, or prepared for. 
Every business worth doing at all is worth doing well, 
and as most businesses consist of a multiplicity of aifairs, 
it is impossible to disentangle each from another, to put 
all in a regular train, and to arrange the whole so that 
nothing may be neglected, without coolness and clear- 
ness of thinking, as well as indefatigable application. 
The morning is necessary to all this, and the time and 
the manner of setting out generally determine the suc- 
cess or the listlessness of the day. Beside, all business- 
es are subject to accidents, and to set forward early is 
to provide for the repair, if not for the prevention of 
them. The husbandman, of all men, is the most to be 
blamed, if he wastes the precious moments of morning ; 
for fallow-time, seed-time, weeding, water-furrowing, 
hay-time, and harvest, must be caught at a moment, or 
they will be lost for a year. It is a fine saying of Job, 
'^ If my land cry against me, or the furrows thereof 



INDUSTRY. 369 

icomplain, let thistles grow instead of wheat, and cockle 
instead of barley." 

Early rising is beneficial to health. 1 am aware, that 
" to ask what is wholesome is like asking whether the 
wind be fair, without specifying to what port we are 
bound ;" for some animals live on poisons : however, it 
may safely be affirmed, that, in general, lying long and 
late in bed impairs the health, generates diseases, and 
in the end destroys the lives of multitudes. It is an in- 
temperance of the most pernicious kind, having nothing 
to recommend it, nothing to set against its ten thousand 
mischievous consequences, for to be asleep is to be dead 
for the time. This tyrannical habit attacks life in its 
essential powers ; it makes the blood forget its way, 
and creep lazily along the veins : it relaxes the fibres, 
unstrings the nerves, evaporates the animal spirits, sad- 
dens the soul, dulls the fancy, subdues and stupifies a 
man to such a degree, that he, the lord of the creation, 
hath no appetite for any thing in it, loathes labour, 
yawns for want of thought, trembles at the sight of a 
spider, and in the absence of that, at the creatures of 
his own gloomy imagination. In every view, there- 
fore, it was wise in the Psalmist to say, " My voice shall 
be heard in the morning." 

Our chief concern at present is with devotion, for 
which, we contend the morning is the proper time. 
The indolent man pretends, he lies in bed because he 
hath nothing to do : and yet he lives in the neglect of 
morning prayer. Let him arise, and do this, and he 
will find abundance of materials at hand to compose 
this good work ; the earlier he rises the more abundant 
his stores will be. To give a sort of order to this ex- 
ercise, let us remark, that there are four funds of early 
devotion : reflection, observation, faith, and foresight. 
I will explain myself. 

To reflect is to look back, and a reflection on six 
hours sleep afi*ords abundant matter for devotion. The 
solemn stillness of the morning, just before break of 
day, is fit and friendly to the cool and undisturbed recol- 
lection of a man just risen from his bed fully refreshed, 
and in perfect health. Let him compare his condition 



370 MORNING EXERCISES. 

with that of half the world, and let him feel an indispo- 
sition to admire and adore his Protector, if he can. How- 
many great events have come to pass in these six hours, 
w^hile I have been dead ? I feel my insignificance. 
The heavenly bodies have moved on, the great wheels 
of nature have none of them stood still, vegetation is 
advanced, the season is come forward, fleets have con- 
tinued sailing, councils have been held, and, on the op- 
posite side of the world, in broad noonday, business and 
pleasure, amusements, battles, and revolutions have ta- 
ken place without my concurrence, consent, or know- 
ledge. Great God ! what am I in the world ? An in- 
sect! A nothing ! "In the morning, O Lord," thou 
GREAT being, " unto thee will I look up." 

How many of my fellow-creatures have spent the 
last six hours in praying in vain for ten minutes sleep ! 
How msLUj in racking pain, crying, " Would God it 
were morning !" How many in prison ! How many 
in the commission of great crimes ! How n^any have 
been burnt out of house and home ! How many have 
been shipwrecked at sea, or lost in untrodden ways on 
the land ! How many have been robbed and murder- 
ed ! How mr.ny have died unprepared, and are now 
lifting up their eyes in torment ! And here stand I, a 
monument of mercy, " the living, the living to praise 
God." " In the morning, O Lord," thou patient and mer- 
ciful being, " unto thee will I look up." I will bemoan 
the vices, and sympathize with the distresses of my fel- 
low-creatures. I will try this day to show my gratitude 
to my Preserver by taking care not to offend him. 

I admire the wisdom of God in the formation of man. 
By what means have I disburdened myself of thfxt load 
of weariness, with which I lay down oppressed ! Whence 
have I derived the vigour and the spirits, which I now 
feel ? A part of the night my rest was perfect, I felt 
nothing. The other part, as I approached to waking, 
my fancy treated me with many pleasing scenes. I 
recollect them with I know not what satisfaction still . . . 
In some such manner as this, will the early Christian 
use his recollection in the morning, and will adore the 
perfections of God. " In the morning, O Lord, wiU I 
■ look up." 



INDUSTRY. 371 

Let him aTail himself next of observation. Let us 
look about us, and take notice, at least, of some of the 
beauties of nature in the morning, for '' the heavens de- 
clare the glory of God, the firmament sheweth his han- 
dy work, and day uttereth speech." How incompara- 
bly fine is the dawning of the day, when the soft and 
stealthy light comes at first glimmering with the stars, 
and gradually eclipses them all ! How beautifully fit- 
ted to excite our attention is the folding and the parting 
of the grey clouds, drawn back " like a curtain" to give 
us a sight of the most magnificent of all appearances, 
the rising of the sun ! How rich the dew, decking eve- 
ry spire of grass with coloured spangles of endless vari- 
ety, and inexpressible beauty ! Larks mount and fill 
the air with a cheap aod perfect music, and every 
bush and every tree, every steeple and ever}^ hovel 
emits a cooing or a twittering, a warbiing or a chirp- 
ing, a hailing of the return of day. Amidst so many 
voices, shall man be dumb ? Surely, a go6d man must 
say, '' My voice also shait thou hear in the morning, O 
Lord." 

It is in the mornino', remarkably, that '' the ox know- 
eth his owner," and " the ass his masters crib." Then, 
if ever, man feels himself [he monarch, and to him who 
rises first, all dooiestic animals pay their homage. One 
winds and purs about him, another frisks and capers, 
and doth ail but speak. The stern mastiff and the plod- 
ding ox, the nobie horse and the harmless sheep, the 
prating poultry and the dronish ass, all in their own 
way express their joy at the sight of their master; he 
is a god to them, for " the eyes of all wait on him, and 
he giveth them their meat in their season." It is to 
these animals, that the Prophet sends us for instruction, 
and from their behaviour to us he would have us learn 
our duty to God. Let us observe how much these crea- 
tures contribute to our ease and comfort through life ; 
let us remark that we owe them all they look to us for ; 
let us acknov/ledge the debt, and our inability to dis- 
charge it without the supplies of Providence ; let us 
address our prayers and praises to that good Master in 
heaven, whose stewards we have the honour to be : let 



372 MORNING EXERCISES. 

lis lay up for this great family, who have " neither 
storehouse nor barn ;" let us supply them with a liberal 
hand ; and for wisdom and prudence to perform all these 
duties, let us resolve with the Psalmist, " My voice 
shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord. In the morn- 
ing will I direct my prayer unto thee, and will look up." 

When man walks abroad in a morning, every sense 
is feasted, and the finest emotions of an honest and be- 
nevolent heart are excited. It is next to impossible to 
be sour or dull. Above, the spacious canopy, " the tab- 
ernacle," or tent " for the sun," in a thousand clouds of 
variegated form-?, glowing with colours in every con- 
ceivable mixture, skirted and shaded with sulky mists, 
affords a boundless track of pleasure to the eye. 
Around, the fragrant air, perfumed by a variety of flow- 
ers, TG freshes his ;-mell. He snuffs the odour, and tastes, 
as it were, in delicate mixtures the sours and the 
sweets. The village pours forth its healthful sons, 
each with his cattle parting off to his work, with inno- 
cence in his employment, a ruddy health in his counte- 
nance, and spirits and cheerfulness in his address, that 
make him an object of envy to a king. Here the sly 
shepherd's boy surveys and plots for his flock, and there 
the old herdman tales and talks to his cattle, and loves, 
pattinsT their flanks, to chant over the history of every 
heifer under his care. And have 1 only nothing to do 
in this busy scene : have I nothing to say among so ma- 
ny voices ? Am I a man, and have I no pleasure in see- 
ing the'peace and plenty, the health and happiness of 
my fellow creatures ! Have I no good wishes for them ? 
" O Lord, in the morning will I direct my prayer unto 
thee, and will look up." 

Should we make our observations on a different sea- 
son of the year, on the morning after a tempestuous 
night, in which the howling winds had torn up our tim- 
bers by the roots, overset our tottering chimnies, and 
carried half the thatch of our cottages away ; or in 
which our sheep lay buried in drifts of snow, and the 
other cattle were deprived of all their green winter 
meat : or in which our rivers had swelled into floods, 
blown up the banks, laid all our meadows under water. 



INDUSTRY. ^73 

covered the very ridges of our corn, threatened the 
lives of all our flocks, and " destroyed the hope of 
man ;" in all these, and in all other such cases, the per- 
fections of God are displayed, the emotions of men and 
Christians excited, and the language of the text enforc- 
ed, '' My voice shalt thou hear in the morning, O Lord. 
In the morning will I direct my prayer unto thee, and 
will look up." 

Having in some such way as this made our observa- 
tions, let us proceed to extract devotion in the morn- 
ing from the storehouse of faith. For this purpose let 
Hs divide Scripture into the two general parts of histo- 
ry of the past, and prophecy of the future ; the first is 
credible, we believe it hath been, the last is credible, 
and we believe it will be. We suppose a good man's 
memory to be well furnished with Scripture, and for 
this purpose we have often advised youag people to get 
by heart every night, the last thing they do before they 
go to rest, one verse, to think of it till they drop asleep, 
and in the morning when they wake that verse will 
probably be the first thought. This will always afford 
a subject for a morning meditation, and the practice 
continued for seven years will fill and enrich the mind 
with the word of God. A great advantage through life, 
and doubled when, along with old age, dimness of sight 
or blindness conies, so that, however desirous, we cannot 
then read the Holy Book. 

In the historical parts of Scripture we may observe 
in general that industry and early rising are inculcated 
as a doctrine ; as, " Thou shalt diligently keep the 
commandments . . . Give diligence to make your call- 
ing and election sure." They are exemplified as a 
practice, as, " Awake, I myself will awake early . . . 
Abraham gat up early in the morning . . . Jacob rose 
up early in the morning . . . Moses rose early in the 
morning . . . Joshua rose early . . . Samuel rose early . . . 
Job rose early in the morning . . . King Darius rose very 
early in the morning . . . Jesus came early in the morn- 
ing into the temple, and all the people came early in 
the morning to hear him." All these were probably 
early risers by habit, and it is certain most of them 



374 MORNING EXERCISES. 

were. Moreover, the practice is encouraged by ex- 
press promise, as, " I love them that love me, and those 
that seek me early shall find me." 

Beside this general view of "Scripture history, there 
18 a particular and not unedifying view of some remark- 
able mornings, of which I will just give you a sketch to 
direct your meditations. That was a morning long to 
be remembered, in which the angel hastened Lot, and 
led him and his family out of Sodom. The sun rose be- 
fore he entered Zoar, and when '^ Abraham gat up ear- 
ly, and looked towards Sodom, he beheld, and, lo, the 
smoke of the country went up as the smoke of a fur- 
nace." It was an happy morning in the life of Isaac, 
when peace and plenty were secured to him and his 
family by a contract, confirmed by oath, between him- 
self and a neighbouring king, to perform which " they 
rose betimes in the morning," It was a morning sacred 
to memory with Jacob and his posterity, when after his 
dream of a frame with steps, opening a passage from 
earth to the temple of the King of kings, graced with 
heavenly officers going up and coming down, to teach 
him the doctrine of Providence, he " rose up early, set 
up a pillar," and dedicated both the place and himself 
to God. Nor could time ever raze out of his memory 
that other morning, when " a man wrestled with him 
until the breaking of the day. Let me go," said one, 
" for the day breaketh ; I will not let thee go," replied 
tiie other, '' except thou bless me." What memorable 
mornings were those, in which Moses " rose up early," 
stood before Pharaoh, and in the name of Almighty God 
demanded liberty for his nation ! What a night was 
that, in which the Israelites passed through the sea, and 
what a morning succeeded, when Moses stretched out 
his hand, and the tide rolled back with the dawning of 
the day, and floated the carcasses of the Egyptians to 
the feet of the people of God on the shore ! Early 
every morning for forty years the cloud was taken up, 
and the manna fell. What a busy morning was that, in 
which Gideon suppressed idolatry at the hazard of his 
life ! What an honourable morning was that to Daniel, 
when a great king visited him in the lion's den ! And, 



INDUSTRY. 375 

to mention no more, that was "a morning" sacred to 
memory throughout all generations, in which Jesus 
" the king of Israel was cut off." A belief of these true 
histories furnishes matter for early meditation, prayer, 
and praise. 

There are two future mornings foretold in the Holy 
Scripture, both figurative, but each descriptive of a real 
event. Ignorance is called darkness, and it was fore- 
told that after the death of the Apostles the Christian 
world would be beclouded and benighted with error : 
but it was foretold by the same men, that truth should 
contend against error, and at last obtain tiie victorj^- 
This notion, which is generally received among Pro- 
testants, is the ground of many popular phrases, as the 
" darkness" of popery . . the " light" of Ptevelation . . . 
the " dawn" of the Reformation appeared in the time of 
WicklifFe . . . learning threw '*• light" on the Scriptures 
. . . the reformation was a ••' morning with clouds" . . . 
light hath gradually increased ever since . . . future 
times will be " broad nooc-daj^" We have not time 
now to justify these popular notions by Scripture proph- 
ecies ; let it suffice in general to say, they are very rea- 
sonable, strictly scriptural, full of motives to virtue, 
and abounding with consolation to all good men. Let 
" cities be filthy and polluted," let princes be roaring 
lions, judges evening wolves, prophets light and treach- 
erous persons, priests violators of law :" no matter, we 
do not despair ; '^ the just Lord is in the midst thereof, 
he will not do iniquity, every morning doth he bring 
his judgment to light, he faileth not," though " the un- 
just know no shame." 

The other morning is that of the resurrection of the 
dead, the beginning of the day of judgment. Then " the 
dead shall hear the voice of the Son of man, and all 
that are in the graves shall come forth : they that have 
done good unto the resurrection of life ; and they that 
have done evil unto the resurrection of damnation." 
This event will bring us to understand thoroughly the 
perfections of God, the wisdom and goodness of Provi- 
dence, the true character of Christ, the dignity of man, 
the horror of sin, the excellence of virtue, the joy of 



376 MORNING EXERCISKS. 

heaven, and the misery of unquenchable fire. On these 
accounts the judging of the world is called a " day, a 
day of wrath, and a day of revelation." Is it possible 
to believe these events, and not feel emotions of piety ? 
Have we no fear of the Judge, no prayer to address to 
him ? What time so natural, as that, in which we rise 
from bed as from a grave, from sleep, that image of 
death ! " In the morning, O Lord, will I direct my 
prayer unto thee." 

I hasten to a close by remarking another source of 
devotion, which I called foresight. An ill-chosen term, 
say you, foy we know not what a day shall bring forth. 
True. Let your ignorance of the events of the day, 
then, engage you every morning to commit yourself, 
and all your affairs by acts of humble adoration to God. 
Profess your confidence in his good Providence. Con- 
fess and bemoan your imperfection and sin. Pray him 
to give you grace to help in time of need. Fill your 
heart brim full of just sentiments, and so prepare for 
whatever may come to pass in the day. 

Amidst all our ignorance of the next hour, there are 
some things which we foresee conditionally, and others 
absolutely. It is absolutely certain, that some day we 
must die. Perhaps this may be the day. Let us then 
this morning behave as if this were the day. It is ab- 
solutely certain that some day we must be judged. Per- 
haps this may be the day. Let us examine this morn- 
ing, then, whether our accounts be ready to put into the 
hand of the Lord, whose stewards only we are ? On 
condition we live through the day, we shall live, as we 
have done, supported by God for ends of his glory. 
Shall we not say in the morning, " Our Father, who art 
in heaven. Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom 
come. Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven ?" 
If we live, we shall live as we have lived, preserved 
alive by eating, drinking, clothing, and so on. Shall 
we not, then, say to the Preserver of men, " Give us 
this day our daily bread ?" If we live we shall offend 
God, and others will offend us. Let us pray in the 
morning, then, '' Forgive us our trespasses, as we for- 
give them that trespass against us." If we live, we 



CAUTION. 37*!^ 

shall live depraved creatures in a depraved world, full 
of temptations to induce us to do wrong. Let us foresee 
this, and say to our Heavenly Father, " Lead us not in- 
to temptation, but deliver us from evil." Let us re- 
joice, that there is such a being as God ; and let us say 
to him, " Thine is the kingdom" of nature, providence, 
grace, and glory : " thine is the power" of upholding 
and regulating each : and to thee be " the glory" and 
the honour of the whole " forever and ever. Amen." 

In this manner let us begin each day, ever remem- 
bering that the morning gives the day its turn either to 
devotion or sin. Now let us depart, in peace with 
God, with our own consciences, and with all mankind. 
Let us go in the name of the Lord, one to his farm, an- 
other to his merchandise, and all to some labour useful 
to society. " Grace be with you all." Amen. 



EXERCISE II 

, CAUTION. 



[AT GREAT EVERSDEJY.] 

JOB xxiv, 5. 

Behold^ as wild asses in the desert go they forth to their 
■work^ rising betimes for a prey : the wilderness yieldctk 
food for them and for their children. 

It is not enough that we rise early, and pray in a 
morning : we rise to live one more day, and we ought 
to get up with all our senses about us, that we may con- 
trive how to live like men and Christians in a world 
not every where favourable to liberty, property, and 
morality. 

The book of Job was written to free us from the fol- 
ly of imagining that the present life is a state of reward^ 
and punishments, and to inform us that it is a state of 
trial and exercise, to prepare us for a future life. The 
32* 



378 MORNING EXERCISES. 

precise intention of Job, in this chapter, is to convince 
us that the wicked often prosper, and the rigfhteous suf- 
fer here : but that there is nothing in ail this inconsist- 
ent with the perfections of God: on the contrary he 
bringeth good out of evil, and works virtue in the right- 
eous by the vices of the wicked. Do the wicked " re- 
move the landmark ?" The act will provoke the equi- 
ty of a good man to replace it. Do they rob the widow 
of her ox, and the fatherless of his ass ? The op- 
pression of these poor sufferers will excite feelings of 
sympathy, and flowings of generosity. "Why" says 
Job, "seeing times are not hidden from the Almighty, 
do they that know him not see his days ?" 

Agreeably to this general sense of the chapter, I am 
going to remark to you the vices and dangers that sur-* 
round you, and to exhort you to exercise that caution, 
which such a situation requires. May the God of the 
morning bless our meditation to virtuous and holy pur- 
poses ! 

To begin with the chapter. Let us take care of our 
understandings. We live surrounded with ignorant peo- 
ple, but saith Job, " Why do they not see the days of 
the Almighty ?" Why do they not perceive there is a 
God, who governs the world, who is a guardian of vir- 
tue, and a punisher of sin ? It is because they make no 
religious use of their senses, and therefore as they make 
no observations they have no understandings. There 
was an ignorant nurse in a certain family, to whom the 
care of an infant was committed : she, under some idle 
pretence of convenience to herself, made a practice 
every morning, when she dressed the child, of pinning 
down its little arms to its sides with a ribband. The 
consequence was, when the child could feel its feet, it 
had very little use of its arms. Had not this been dis- 
covered, and discontinued, two enfeebled arms would 
have fallen to the lot of the unhappy victim. Any limb, 
any sense may be lost for want of use. It is exactly 
thus with the mind, and an understanding not used is so 
near to none, that there is very little difference in know- 
ledge between some huge-sized men, and infants and 
idiots. 



CAUTION. 579 

There are two sorts of people who ought to attend to 
this case. The first are benumbed with popular errors, 
one of which is, that common people should not pretend 
to think, and debate, and determine on religion, but 
leave that to their guides. Take care of this error, and 
trust nobody : your guides may be right, but you must 
be wrong. At least, exercise your understandings to 
distinguish a wise from a foolish guide, a fallible from 
an infallible leader. The other sort continue in igno- 
rance though false notions of religion. They think, 
personal religion is to come down like a shower of rain, 
and, not distinguishing themselves from plants and trees, 
are weak enough to imagine they shall grow good as a 
parched heath grows green. Will our gardens and 
fields produce a crop without cultivation ? Will our 
lives and healths be preserved without food and exer- 
cise ? Can we understand any thing without thinking 
about it? Can we please God without diligence, or en- 
joy him without virtue ? Let us take care, then, to ex- 
ercise our own understandings on the works of nature, 
which are along with us all the day ; on the ways of 
Providence, which are constantly offering themselves to 
our view; and on the Holy Scriptures, which lie open 
before us, and call us to run the race of a holy life, and 
obtain the prize of immortal happiness. 

Let us take care of our property. The context tells 
us, " Some remove the landmark ; they violently take 
away flocks, and feed thereof." They first drive away 
the cattle, next remove the landmark, and lastly claim 
and possess themselves of the herbage and the soil. Let 
us be cautious how we act, and to this purpose let us 
guard against three usual sources of injustice in our- 
selves, and the three sorts of people who would prac- 
tise it upon us. 

One cause of injustice is idleness. An idle man, like 
all other men, is subject to hunger, and thirst, and cold, 
and sickness ; and these necessities must be relieved : 
but as he does nothing toward his own relief, he is 
tempted to supply his wants with the earnings of the 
industrious ; and as thieving is less laborious than work- 
ing, he yields to the temptation. Flee from idleness 



380 MORNING EXfiRCISES. 

and avoid the company of idle men, for their talk is per^ 
nicious ; their maxims, like their actions, all go on thj? 
great principle of saving trouble. When I see a poor 
idle man, I always suspect he is a thief. 

Wastefulness is another source of injustice. To con- 
sume any thing unnecessarily argues an absence of mind 
ungraceful in any man ; but in a poor man waste is an 
abomination, for which we have no name. When pru- 
dent rich people observe thi3 in the poor, it shuts up 
their generous hands, for it is not an alms, it is not day- 
labour, it is not trade, it is not the fortune of a peer 
that can fill this gulf, which ever yawns, and says, Give, 
and never says. It is enough. A man, whom waste hath 
brought to want, is strongly pressed by his necessities 
to be unjust. The wise man informs us, "The slothful 
in his work is brother to him that is a great waster." 
Let such brethren keep company with each other ; but 
let good men avoid them both. 

A third source of injustice is an ignorant confidence m 
'wealth. He, that " saith, to fine gold, Thou art my con- 
fidence," at once betrays the ignorance of an uninform- 
ed mind, and the depravity of a wicked heart. His de- 
pravity lies in his placing such confidence in a creature, 
as ought to be placed only in God. His gross ignorance 
appears in his choice of gold ; for what can gold pur- 
chase for him ? Can he exchange it for inn(#cence ? 
Will it buy repentance ? Can it purchase immortality ? 
Alas 1 It cannot bribe old age, or sickness, remove a 
single pain, or check one unhallowed passion. On the 
contrary, unjust gain is both a crime that cries for ven- 
geance, and a load that sinks a sordid cripple down to 
care, to vice, to death, to hell. A youth, who would 
acquire property, (and why should you not all acquire 
it ?) should be honest and industrious, frugal and reli- 
gious. If he would marry, he should choose a partner 
of the same virtuous kind. Hath he a family ? He 
should train them up in just notions of property. Hath 
he companions ? He should choose such as would not 
endanger his morals, and his happiness, by their vices. 
Hath he business in the world ? Let him watch the 
world, and let him beware of the idle, the wasteful, the 



CAVTlOJf. 381 

immoderate lovers of money, for somebody must bear 
their expenses, and sorrow will be to him on whom the 
unwelcome burden falls. The unwary is most likely to 
be the man. 

Let us take care of our lives. Job saith, " They 
drive away the ass of the fatherless, and take the wid- 
ow's ox for a pledge." Widows and orphans, whatever 
advantages they may have, are objects of pity ; for what 
can women and children do in the business of life ; es- 
pecially, what can they do with oxen and asses, the tend- 
ing of cattle, and the tillage of the field ? In summer 
excessive heat, in winter extreme cold, in journeying 
difficult and dangerous roads, in the field hard labor, in 
fairs and markets tumult and fraud : how can women and 
children encounter all these ? How can a man, who 
hath the least degree of esteem for his wife and family, 
bear the thought of laying violent hands on himself, and 
so of reducing these poor innocents to this forlorn state ? 
If, in any gloomy day, pressed with difficulties, and 
afraid of consequences, we be tempted to destroy our- 
selves, let us repel the temptation by recalling to our 
minds the fatal consequences of the rash action to ouf 
widows and children. Let us picture to ourselves the 
unutterable agony of the family we love at the sight of 
such a horrid corpse. If, in any of our straits, we be 
tempted to steal, and to kill, let the supposed widow 
and children of a man hung in chains deter us. If, on 
any festival, we be tempted to excessive drinking, let 
us flee, lest one act of drunkenness should bring on an- 
other, and that a third, and so a habit of excessive 
drinking should shorten our lives, and expose an honest 
woman, and her innocent children to ills, which pru- 
dence might have prevented. Let us habituate our- 
selves to civility, and avoid a disposition to boast and 
quarrel, lest in some unguarded moment a word should 
produce a blow, lest that blow should be fatal, and leave 
a widow and a fatherless family to mourn over a deed 
that can never be undone. The last step of a worthless 
idle man in a parish is to go for a soldier, that is, to sell 
his own life for nought, and to leave a widow and fa- 
therless children to lamejit their relation to such an un- 



382 SIORNING EXERCISES. 

natural man. We ought to know the nature and the 
worth of liberty; we ought to learn the use of arms; 
we ought to be able and willing to protect our country 
on principles of wisdom and virtue : but we ought not 
to rush into the army merely to get free from labor, or 
to gratify the evil passions of our hearts. If husbands 
and parents do so, their taste costs their family dear. 

We live in a world, where many such widows and 
orphans are. Let us never reproach them with the fol- 
ly and vice of their heads. Let us pity their condition. 
Let us wipe away their tears by kind offices. Let us 
hold their property sacred. Let us lift the children in- 
to life, and smooth the path of the widow to the grave. 
And that we may enjoy this luxury of living, the plea- 
sure of doing good, let us avail ourselves of every wise 
precaution to enable us to obtain an healthy tirm old 
age. Let us he temperate in our diet, cleanly in our 
habitations, cool in our pursuits, moderate in our enjo}'- 
ments, calm in our tempers : in a word, let us live as 
well, that A^e may live as long as we can. 

Let us take care of our time. The text says. The 
wicked " rise betimes for a prey." There are many 
classes of wicked men, who perform all their works of 
darkness in the night, and to whom " the morning is as 
the shadow of death :" but there are other classes, who 
practise their vices by the light of th& day. Not that 
there is any difference in the nature of these crimes : 
the difference is only in the degree. Sin in a small de- 
gree conceals itself under specious pretences, and seems 
tolerable ; but when it hath grown to ripeness, and 
thrown off its covering, its' appearance is so very horri- 
ble, that they, who have been always familiar with it, 
shudder at the sight. A little anger, a small degree of 
hatred, a single taking of the name of God in vain : is 
darkness necessary to any of these ? No : it is murder, 
which is a great act of anger or hatred ; it is blas- 
phemy ; it is any, and every sin broke loose from re- 
straint, and in the exercise of its utmost vigour, that 
shims the light, and is practicable only in the dark : the 
criminal himself durst not see himself commit the crime. 

What a number of people are there in the world. 



CAtJTiON. 383 

who rise betimes to make a prey of their fellow-crea- 
tufes; who industriously live upon the vices and follies 
of mankind; who have formed their own vices into a 
trade, and profess to support it hy arguments extremely 
plausible, because it would be unfashionable to find 
fault with what all the world applaud. Let ns, however 
be allowed to leave these early rising " wild asses" to 
their own pursuits, and let us know the worth of our 
time too well to w^aste it in such pursuits as theirs. If 
a thief, who makes a prey of our property; if a slan- 
derer, who devours our reputation ; if a libertine, or a 
dupe who buys us to sell our liberties ; if an enthusi- 
ast, who deprives men of reason and Scripture to make 
himself necessary ; if all these would condescend to 
teach us their sciences, I hope we should not vouchsafe 
to find time to learn. Let us be cautious how we dis- 
pose of a treasure so precious on pursuits so vile. The 
command is short, but very plain : " Six days shalt thou 
labour : the seventh is the sabbath of the Lord thy 
God." We should allow no time to sin with the world, 
none to superstition with Pharisees and bigots : for in 
the latter case we should fall a prey to the folly of oth- 
ers ; and in the former we should, like wild beasts, learn 
to catch prey ourselves. Recollect, also, that people of 
no religion have one day in seven more than you have, 
a day in which you " do no manner of work ;" but a 
day in which they spend in going over their grounds, 
in seeing their distant stock, in paying their men, in set- 
tling their accounts, sometimes in buying and selling 
cattle, and making bargains, and always in talking over 
their worldly affairs, and consequently in improving 
their knowledge on these subjects. A religious man 
gives up all these advantages for conscience sake ; bat, 
if he be a prudent as well as a pious man, he will gain 
more than he looses by temperance, frugality, industry, 
early rising in the morning, and dexterity in business 
all the day. 

Let us take care of our children. The text says, 
" The wilderness yieldeth food for them, and for their 
children." They live an idle, wandering life, and they 
train up their children to be vagrants like themselves. 



384 MORNING EXERCISES. 

Children are great blessings ; " Happy is the man that 
hath his quiver," that is, his house, ••' full of them." 
Under the direction of a prudent parent, they are " as 
arrows in the hand of a mighty man," and will fly here 
and there to execute his orders. These children have 
every thing to learn, and they will leara every thing of 
those who are the nearest to them. To them example 
is better than all the books in the world, and indeed it 
is the only book they study. Let us not cheat ourselves 
into a neglect of them by groaning about Old Adam, 
nor by chanting over what nobody denies, that God on- 
ly can make a Christian, which is equal to saying, God 
only can make a cucumber. God made the first fruit 
immediately by his own power ; but he hath made fruit 
ever since by means, and the most industrious will al- 
ways have the best garden. Let us use our children 
early to do with little sleep. To put them to bed very 
early, to give them sleeping doses, and such other cus- 
toms, are generally the practices of idle or impatient 
nurses. Let us never under pretence of fondness give 
them strong liquors. The water-bucket is the best sup- 
ply of a poor child. Let us not lacquer their appetites, 
and learn them to be dainty, or voracious. It is a great 
misfortune to the poor to have remarkably great appe- 
tites. Such habits poison and kill. Let us accustom 
them to cleanliness and industry, to civility in their 
manners, and to reverence for their God. Let us nev- 
er think of the savage custom of beating them, nor ev- 
er spoil them by the contrary folly of cockering and 
fondling. Above all, let us teach them to think and 
reason about religion, and to interpret Scripture for 
themselves. Let us take care to inform them that reli- 
gion is justice, and nothing else. What is the religion 
of a poor woman's little girl, but to spin a groat a day ; 
for it is just and right, that she should contribute what 
little she can toward the maintenance of the family ? 
And what is the religion of a poor under boy on a farm 
in a cold winter day, but to rise early, to milk the cows 
clean, to breakfast the sties, to tend the cattle constant- 
ly and kindly, and so on ; for it is just and right that he 
should do so for the benefit of his master, who supplies 



FRUGALITV. 385 

all his wants. Justice makes a good shepherd, a good 
herdman, a good tasker, a good man in every work and 
business of life. We should inculcate this principle in 
these little folks early in life by every thing we do, and 
this will settle them in services, and preserve them 
from idleness, which leads to vagrancy, as that does to 
pilfering and public punishment. 

Let us now turn this subject into prayer, and for five 
minutes address God, in whose hand is life, and breath, 
and all things, that he would vouchsafe to prosper the 
works of our hands while we are well, to grant us re- 
lief when we are sick, and to crown all when we die 
with a blessed immortality, saying to each of us, '^ Well 
done, good and faithful servant, thou hast been faithful 
in a few things, enter thou into the joy of thy Lord." 



EXERCISE III. 

FRUGALITY. 



^ JOHN vi, 12. 
Gather up the fragments^ that nothing he lost. 

The end of all instruction is to enable people to in- 
struct themselves. With this view allow me to inform 
you how to edify yourselves by interpreting Scripture, 
which you read, by the world in which you live, and 
which you every day see. It would mean nothing here, 
to say the Gospel is best proved true by analogy ; I 
might as well say nothing, for such hard words have 
not yet found their way into this village. Let us try to 
do without them. Mark what I am going to say. 

All the comfort we derive from the Gospel is on sup- 
position the Gospel is true : but we are not to suppose 
the Gospel is true without examining whether it be so. 
Now what are we to examine it by ? Suppose I should 
33 



386 MORNING EXERCISES. 

give you a letter, and require you to determine whose 
hand-writing- it was, what would you say? We cannot 
tel!, say you, by this single paper ; we must compare it 
with other papers. Suppose by comparing it with some 
of your landlord's receipts, I should observe, that every 
word, and every letter, and every mark and flourish 
were alike in both, what would you say then ? You 
■would allow, for 3-ou know your landlord's hand, that he 
wrote the letter, and especially as all the contents agree 
with his known character. 

Now apply this. I bring you a history of the glad 
tidings of an exemplarv Saviour written by a Jew, nam- 
ed John, who says, God employed him to write it ; and 
who adds, that the Saviour was like God, and we must 
be like him. Am T to believe him ? Yes, certainly, if 
I find that his book agrees with the works, and the 
character of God, as I have remarked it in a world, 
which I am sure he created : but not else. 

Let us tr}'. Jesus fed a multitude. This is like God, 
who hath filled the world with mouths, and who daily 
fiH> the mouths of all with meat, and we should feed our 
iarailies as he fed his. Jesus taught frugality, and bade 
his servants, " Gather up the fragments, that nothing be 
iost.-' Another character of God, who, amidst all the 
profusions of his bounty, hath so constituted the world, 
ihat there should be no waste, and there is none. A 
Prophet says. The Creator "• weighed" the dust, and 
-■ measured*' the water, when he made the world. He 
calculated to a nicet}', and so much fire, so much water, 
so much air, and so on, went to make up such a world 
as this. The first quantity is here still, and though man 
can gather and scatter, move, mix and unmix, yet he 
can destroy nothing, the putrefaction of one thing is a 
preparation tor the being, and the bloom, and the beau- 
ty of another. Thus a tree gathers nourishment from 
its own fallen leaves, when they decay. Something 
*-' gathers up all fragments," and "nothing is lost." 

Observe what passes in your own yards. The tasker 
in the barn takes down a floor of wheat sheaves, and 
threshes. The head-corn he throws and dresses, and 
puts up for market. The tail he screens, and fans, and 



FRUGALITY. 387 

ries, or rids of its dust and rubbish, to grind for the use 
of the family. The chatf he carries to the horses, the 
straw he tnms out for litter for the cattle, and manure 
for another crop. Mark how the small stock turn the 
straw over and over, beat out every grain that escaped 
the flail, and spread abroad all the rubbish, one class 
picking up the wheat, another the wild oats, a third 
the seeds of darnel and other weeds, and all '' gather- 
ing up the fragments that nothing be lost." Hence we 
say, these animals live upon nothing, and there is no 
waste in a well-stocked farm yard. We mean, Almighty 
God hath created for the honour of his goodness, and 
for the comfort of our lives, a set of animals on purpose 
to put every particle to use, and to turn, as it v/ere, the 
whole mass of dead matter into animal life. One of old 
said, " Go to the ant, thou sluggard ;" we sny^ Go to the 
fowls, thou unthrift; or rather, Go to the Creator of 
fowls and ants, and learn that the voice t"hat made the 
world spoke the text, " Gather up the fragments, that 
nothing be lost." 

We are, then, to consider frugality as an imitation of 
Christ, and of God. To be frugal is to resemble both. 
I shall not detain you long: but as frugality lies all 
along-side of covetousness, we must guard the path, lest 
we should step over the line : and as we are apt to loi- 
ter even in a right road, we must try to animate our- 
selves. We will therefor© observe what frugality is, 
and why we should practise it. 

Let us be frugal in our dress. Clothes are for the 
safet}', or ornament of the body. Becoming ornaments 
may be allowed to youth : but ornaments become none 
except the handsome. To all others ornaments only at- 
tract people's ej^es to behold inlirmity and ugliness. 
Adorn your persons with natural flowers, they are cheap 
and perfect : or adorn yourselves with ^ood, not gaudy 
■needlework of your own. Neat Avork, on a ground of 
cleanliness, set off with the natural charms of innocence 
and virtue, are a character to a young woman, which 
all her neighbours can read. Most of us need only stu- 
dy the safety of our health in our dress. We should 
adapt this to our circumstances ; we should buy thew, 



388 MORNING EXERCISES. 

and wear them, and repair them without waste, and 
without a passion for fashion and finery. To be neat 
and clean, and dressed in hubils fit for our employments, 
is the true decency of a plain countryman. 

Let us be frugal in our diet. The end of taking" food 
is the preservation of health. If food doth any thing" 
more than keep us well, it does too much. In the long 
hot days of harvest, we require much nourishment, be- 
cause we expend much strength : but the plenty that 
abounds then should not tempt us to intemperance. 
Enough of a plain, cheap, wholesome diet to keep us in 
perfect health, and equal to our work, is sll that is re- 
quisite : nor should we waste food or drink, for winter 
follows on the heels of harvest. Let us be frugal in our 
furniture.) and not gratify a passion, excited in a market 
town, of filling our houses with expensive and useless 
lumber. There is a fitness between the house and its 
furniture. Strong, useful things, plain, whole and 
cheap, become the situation and the circumstances of 
inhabitants of villages. 

Let us be thrifty of our money. There is a certain 
skill, which our forefathers used to call a knack, an art 
of doing things, and it is remarkably seen in many poor 
women's laying out the earnings of their husbands. Call 
it what we will, it is one of the highest qualifications of 
a poor man's wife, and nothing contributes more to the 
ease of his living than this female accomplishment. 
How she reckons I cannot tell : but she keeps out of 
debt, lives in cleanliness and plenty, and can always 
spare half a dozen turves to warm a cold sick neigh- 
bour's cordial. She says, Viy husband's harvest wages 
clothe himself and the children, my gleaning pays the 
shoemaker, the orchard pays my rent, the garden does 
this, the flail procures that, the children's spinning 
wheels yield so and so ; and, good heart ! she crowns all 
by saying, " Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not 
all his benefits. He forgiveth all thine iniquities, and 
hcaleth all thy diseases. He redeemeth thy life from 
destruction, and crowneth thee with lovingkindness 
and tender mercies. He satisfieth thy mouth with good 
things, so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's. 



FRUGALITV. 589 

Bless the Lord in all places of his donriiDion. Bless tlx* 
Lord, O my soul !" 

Let us be frugal of our time^ and not spare one hour 
in the year for idleness or vice. Let us husband our 
strength^ and not waste it in violent, iniprudent, and un- 
necessary exertions. Let us be economists with our 
reason and passions. Let us leave others to wrangle 
about trifles, and let us save all our strength for the 
manly subjects of a Briton and a ChrisUan. Let us ha- 
bituate ourselves to understand and to defend this great 
truth, the foundation of government and good order, 
" Righteousness exalteth a nation ; but sin is a reproach 
to any people." Let us know how to reason for reli- 
gion, " the mighty acts of the Lord." Let us not waste 
our passions upon improper objects. Let us reserve 
fear for God, love for justice, despair fof happiness in 
sin, and hope ibr a blessed immortality. 

I do think, I may leave off. You all know, or may 
know of one another why you should be frugal. One 
can say, if you be not irugai, you will be naked, and 
cold, and poor, and hungry, and without a friend to pity 
you : another will say. If you be wasteful, you will ex- 
cite the indignation of all your neighbours for your bar- 
barous treatment of your wife and children. The over- 
seers will justly reproach you, when you ask for relief, 
and the rest of the poor will think your supply pilfered 
from their scanty tables. Others will tell you, your 
wastefulness deprives you of all the joy of doing good, 
and all the honour of giving the parish an example of 
virtue. We all say ycu are not like -esus Christ, and 
you are a scandal to his name. But what will the Judge 
say at the last day ? . . . The clock strikes . . . Depart 
. . . Peace be with you . . . The first quarter of an hour 
you can spare, bid one of your children read to you the 
sixteenth of Luke ; it begins thus, " And he said also 
unto his disciples. There was a certain rich man, which 
had a steward ; and the same was accused unto him, that 
he had wasted his goods" . . . Let us say the Lord's 
prayer, and depart. 

33* 



390 MORNING EXERCISES* 



EXERCISE IV. 

COVETOUSNESS, 

[^T HAUXT0N.1 



4Vhen I saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, 
and two hundred shekels of silver^ and a zvedge of gold 
of fifty shekels weighty then I coveted them, and took 
them ; and, behold, they are hid in the earth in the midst 
of my tent, and the silver under it. 

Last month we spoke of frugality ; now let us turn 
our attention to covetousness ; for, as we have often 
said, there is only a thin partition between the last step 
of virtue and the first of vice. Justice carried too far 
becomes cruelty ; and excessive frugality is parsimony, 
or covetousness. 

The man in the text, in one view, it should seem at 
first sight, was an object of pity ; for gold and silver 
and fine clothes, to be had for carriage, formed a great 
temptation. Hence arises a question. Why doth Provi- 
dence put in our way such agreeable objects, and yet 
forbid us to touch them ? Let us give glory to God by 
acknowledging, that by such means we are exercised, 
first as creatures to discover the natural grandeur of our 
own passions, the incompetence of the world to make 
us happy, and, if reason be not asleep, the all-sufficiency 
of God. Next, these exercises try us as servants, and 
by the emotions of depraved passions we become ac- 
quainted with the natural rebellion of an evil heart, that 
disputes dominion with God. By these we learn to "ab- 
hor ourselves, and repent in dust and ashes." By these 
we discover the wisdom of him, who taught us to pray, 
" Our Father, lead us not into temptation." By an ha- 
bitual deadness to these, because God commands it, we 
discover the true religion of a renewed mind, and enter 



COVETOUSNESS. 391 

on the enjoyment of conscious rectitude, a preference 
of virtue, the felicity of heaven. 

Why then do we blame Achan ? Because he was not 
a boy, for none but men above twenty bore arms, and 
he was old enough to know that he ought not to have 
disobeyed his general, or his God. Because he was a 
Jew, and of the tribe of Judah, and had been brought 
up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. Because 
he must have heard what mischief the golden calf, the 
iniquity of Peor, and the murmuring at Kadesh had 
brought upon his countrymen. Because he knew God 
had expressly forbidden plunder. Had he exercised his 
understanding, some or all these reasons would have 
cooled his passions for perquisites. In like manner we 
say of ourselves. We have temptations and passions ; 
but we have reason, too, to resist them. We have pas- 
sions ; but we have had a Christi in education, and have 
been apprized of the danger of gratifying them. We 
have passions ; but we have eyes and ears, and live 
among people, who daily die for gratifying the same 
passions which we feel. We covet ; but God says^ 
" Thou shait not covet any thing that is thy neigh- 
bour's." 

To covet is to desire beyond due bounds. God hath 
set these due bounds. He hath bounded passion by rea- 
son, and reason by religion and the nature of things. 
If a man of twenty years of age, to whom Providence 
hath given both reason and passions, should lay aside 
his reason, and make use of only his passions, he would 
act as preposterously as if, having both legs and arms, 
he should resolve to walk with his legs but never to 
make the least use of his arms. May I say? Yes, let 
me say, reason is intended to poise the passions, and to 
prevent a fall. Perhaps all this is too general ; let us in 
a short detail show the unreasonableness of covetous- 
ness. 

Covetousness is unjust. Let the prince enjoy the 
privilege of his birth ; let the man, who hath hazarded 
his life for wealth, possess it in peace ; let the industri- 
ous enjoy the fruit of his labour; to transfer their prop- 
erty to myself without their consent, and without put- 



392 MORNIITG EXERCISES. 

ting something as good in the place, would be an act of 
injustice. Only to covet is to wish to be unjust. 

Covetousness is crtiel. A man of this disposition is 
obliged to harden his heart against a thousand plaintive 
voices: voices of poor, fatherless, sick, aged, and be- 
reaved people in distress ; voices that set many an eye 
a trickling, but which make no impression on a cove- 
tous man. 

Covetousness is ungrateful. A covetous old man was 
once a child ; has he no feelings of gratitude for his 
nurses ; or, if they be dead, has he none for other poor 
women now employed in nursing such as he was, and 
whose tenderness and care will never be half paid for ? 
He was once in business ; hath he no feelings of grati- 
tude for the old servants, who assisted him to get his 
wealth ; or, if they be dead, are none of their children 
or grand-children left in want? Shall the whole world 
labour for this old miser, one to feed him, another to 
guard him, and all to make him happy, and shall he re- 
semble the barren earth, that returns nothing to him 
that dresseth it ? This is a black ingratitude. 

Covetousness is a foolish vice ; it destroys a man's 
reputation, makes every body suspect him for a thief 
and watch him ; it breaks his rest, tills him with care 
and anxiety, excites the avarice of a robber, and the 
indignation of a house-breaker; it endangers his life, 
and, depart how he will, he dies unblest and unpitied. 

Covetousness is unprecedented in all our examples of 
virtue. The Scripture shows us many sorts of good 
men, and honestly acknowledges their faults. One 
spoke unadvisedly with his lips, another cursed and 
swore, a third was in a passion, and a fourth committed 
adultery : but which of the saints ever lived in a habit 
of covetousness! It is Judas, who hanged himself, and 
not such as Peter, whom covetous men imitate. 

Covetousness is idolatry. It is the idolatry of the 
heart, where, as in a temple a miserable wretch ex- 
cludes God, sets up gold instead of him, and places that 
confidence in it, which belongs to the great Supreme 
alone. The fears and the hopes, the sorrows and the 
joys of a. miser hover about his idol, as the spirits of the 



COVETOUSNESS. 393 

just wait round the throne of God. In effect, the blas- 
phemy of such a criminal addresses that to gold, which 
good men say to God, " Whom have I in heaven but 
thee ? and there is nothing upon earth that I desire be- 
sides thee." 

After all this we affect to wonder, that God should 
choose to give us one example of the punishment of 
such a sinner. We are not shocked at Providence, 
when we see a miser starve himself to death : but should 
the Judge of the world prevent his killing himself, and 
choose to make him edify the world by his death, after 
he had scandalized it by his life, why should we be as- 
tonished? This man in the text was doomed to be 
burnt, but not alive ; he was therefore first stoned to 
death, then consumed by fire along with his accompli- 
ces and his plunder, and the place was called, as the 
place of every miser deserves to be called, " The val- 
ley of trouble" to this day. 

Achan, and all such as he, cause a great deal of trou- 
ble, and, to pass every thing else, let us only observe 
what covetous men do with their wealth. " Behold it 
is hid in the earth in the midst of my tent." 

Observe a miser with his bag. With what an arch 
and jealous leer the wily fox creeps stealthily about 
and about to earth his prey ! He hath not a friend in 
the world, and judging Of others by himself, he thinks 
there is not an honest man upon earth, no, not one that 
can be trusted. Doth it not vex an ingenuous soul to 
see such an image of a beast in the shape of a man ? 
Disgustful triumph : " Behold it is hid in the earth in 
the midst of my tent." 

Remark his caution. He turns his back on his idol, 
trudges far away, looks lean, and hangs all about his 
own skeleton ensigns of poverty, never avoiding people 
in real distress, but alwa3^s comforting himself with the 
hope, that nobody knows of his treasure, and that there- 
fore nobody expects any assistance from him. How 
vexatious to any upright soul to see a wretch feeding on 
falsehood, and revolving in his memory by way of plea- 
sure, " Behold, it is hid in the earth in the midst of my 
t«Qt." 



394 MORNING EXERCISES, 

Take notice of the just contempt, in which mankind 
hold this hoary mass of meanness. He thinks his wealth 
is hid : but it is not hid ; his own anxious side looks be- 
tray the secret. People reckon for him, talk over all 
his profits, omit his expenses and losses, declare his 
wealth to be double what it is, and judge of his duty ac- 
cording to their own notions of his fortune. One lays 
out this good work for him, another rates him at so 
much towards such a charity, and all execrate him for 
not doing what is not in his power. Prudent men can- 
not justify him, and even they are obliged to allow that 
half the popular contempt is just. How painful to a 
benevolent man to see a hoary head despised ! How 
much is his pain increased by knowing that the scorn is 
just, for '' Behold," be his wealth little or much, it is 
not used, " it is hid in the earth in the midst of his 
tent !" 

Mark his hypocrisy. He weeps over the profligacy 
of the poor, and says, it is a sad thing, that they are 
brought up without being educated in the fear of God. 
He laments, every time the bell tolls, the miserable con- 
dition of widows and orphans. He celebrates the praise 
of learning, and wishes public speakers had all the pow- 
ers of a learned criticism, and all the graces of elocu- 
tion. He prays for the down-pouring of the Spirit, and 
the out-goings of God in his sanctuary, and then, how 
his soul would be refreshed! What a comfortable 
Christian would he be then ! Tell this son of the morn- 
ing, that there are schoolmasters waiting to educate the 
poor, tutors longing to instruct youth, and young men 
burning with a vehement passion for learning and ora- 
tory ; tell him that the gratitude of widows, the hymns 
of orphans, and the blessings of numbers ready to per- 
ish, are the presence of God in his church. Tell him 
all these wait to pour themselves like a tide into his 
congregation, and wait only for a little of his money to 
pay for cutting a canal. See, how thunder-struck he is ! 
His solemn face becomes lank and black, he suspects he 
has been too liberal already, his generosity has been 
often abused, why should he be taxed and others spared,, 
the Lord will save his own elect, God is never at a los«- 



SELF-PRESERVATION. 



395 



for means, no exertions will do without the Divine pre- 
sence and blessing-, and beside, his property is all locked 
up, '' Behold, it is hid in the earth in the midst of my 
tent !" 

Let us respect truth even in the mouth of a miser. 
This ignoble soul tells you, that he would not give a 
wedge of gold to save you all from eternal ruin : but he 
says, God is not like him, God loves you, and will save 
you freely. This is strictly and literally true. There 
have been thousands of poor people besides you, who 
have been instructed and animated, converted and sav- 
ed, without having paid one penny for the whole : but 
this, instead of freezing, should melt the hearts of all 
who are able, and set them a running into acts of gen- 
erosity. I conclude with the words of an ancient teach- 
er in Italy, one Ambrose, more remarkable for his wit 
than for the accuracy of his judgment. " Joshua," said 
,he, " could stop the course of the sun: but all his pow- 
er could not stop the course of avarice. The sun stood 
still, but avarice went on. Joshua obtained a victory 
when the sun stood still : but when avarice was at work, 
Joshua was defeated." Grace be with you all. Amen, 



EXERCISE V. 

SELF-PRESERVATION. 

[^T FULBORJVE.] 



JOB ii, 4. 

Sk^n for skin^ yea all that a man hath will he give 
for his life. 

Before the invention of money, trade used to be car- 
ried on by barter, that is, by exchanging one commodi- 
tv for another. The man, who had been hunting in the 
woods for wild beasts, would carry their skins to mar- 
ket, and exchange tiiem with the armourer for so many 



2^96 MOENING EXERCISES. 

bows and arrows. As these traffickers were liable to 
be robbed, they sometimes agreed to give a party of 
men a share for defending them, and skins were a very 
ancient tribute. With them, they redeemed their own 
shares of property, and their lives. It is to one, or 
both of these customs that the text alludes as a proverb. 

Imagine one of these primitive fairs. A multitude 
of people, from all parts of different tribes and lan- 
guages, in a broad field, all overspread with various 
commodities to be exchanged. Imagine this fair to be 
held after a good hunting-season, and a bad harvest. 
The skinners are numerous, and clothing cheap. Wheat, 
the staff of life, is scarce, and the whole fair dread a 
famine. How many skins this year will a man give for 
this necessary article, without which he and his family 
must inevitably die ? Why, each would add to the 
heap, and put " skin upon skir;,''^ for " all the skins that 
a man hath will he give for his life." Imagine the 
wheat-growers, of which Job was one, carrying home 
the skins, which they had taken for wheat. Imagine the 
party engaged to protect them raising the tribute, and 
threatening if it were not paid to put them to death. 
W^hat proportion of skins would these merchants give, 
in this case of necessity? "Skin upon skin, all the 
skins that they have will they give for their lives." 
The proverb then means, that we should save our lives 
at any price. Let us apply it to ourselves 

Life may be destroyed by violence. How many 
wretched people have fled for refuge to a river, a rope, 
or a razor? Thy are always objects of pity, for a man 
must suffer a deal before he can work himself up to 
this cruel attack upon himself. We generally hope such 
a person was insane. This is a charitable error : but 
really in some cases we are forced to hope against hope. 
Whiat would it have cost some of these unhappy crea- 
tures to have saved their lives. Nothing but a little 
courage to have told their trouble to a friend, and to 
have taken advice. Nothing but a little patience to 
have borne the calamities of poverty, disappointment, or 
fear. In such sad moments let us exert ourselves. All 
that a man can do, he should do to preserve his pre- 
cious life. 



SELF-PRESERVATION. 397 

The intemperance of the senses destroys life. Meat 
and drink of improper kinds, or in improper quantities, 
are slow poisons, which effectually kill people of inor- 
dinate appetites. Intemperance heaps disease upon dis- 
ease, and persecutes life through every pore, till life is 
a burden, and death the only relief. Study your feel- 
ings, they are your best physicians, and, remember, it 
is health that gives life its glee. To be well, what a 
luxury ! To be in health, and alive in every fibre, 
what a cheap acquisition, when only moderation is the 
price ! 

Life is destroyed by excessive passions. The body is 
a nice machine, wisely adjusted for the purpose of even 
and constant use. When passion, like a mad-man in a 
mill, sets all the powers a going without their proper 
balance, the machine takes tire, and the fool himself is 
consumed. Anger fires, envy gnaws, discontent frets, 
pride strains, avarice dries up, every passion racks the 
body somewhere, and all together rend it into shivers, 
and toss it by in the grave. Whence comes this whirl- 
wind of destruction ? What are we angry about ? 
Whom do we envy ? What advantage are we proud 
of? What is it that we are hoarding up ? What ! Will 
I not agree to live in my cottage because the squire oc- 
cupies the great house ! Will I not taste my cabbage 
because my neighbour has a larger! What ! Am I so 
proud of my three skeps of bees, that I must spend 
three times the worth of them at the alehouse to talk 
over the courage, and the prudence, and the amazing 
accomplishments of a bee-master ! Wretched people 
that we are ! Is it thus we squander life away ? 

Life is destroyed by carelessness. Aged people and 
children should not be left alone : they are not equal to 
the task of taking care of themselves. Pious old peo- 
ple pay for being waited on by their edifying conversa- 
tion, and the little folks will reward us by and by, if we 
use them properly. Let us not neglect their lives. Let 
us, too, take care of our own. We have often ^observed 
labouring men, early in the morning at mowing time, 
strip to work, and throw their clothes on the grass full 
of dew. At breakfast time, heated with mowing, wei 
34 



398 MORNING EXERCISES. 

have seen them take up and put on their clothes, not 
considering that rheumatic pains, and agues, and con- 
sumptions, and a thousand diseases enter that way. A 
little cold is a little death, a little more chills us to clay, 
and fits us for the grave. It is not only life in general 
that should be the object of our care, the life of every 
part is inestimable. What would some people give for 
one eye, or one ear, or one of the healthful pains of 
hunger? If we have these blessings, and if care will 
preserve them, we shall be inexcusable not to exer- 
cise it. 

False religion will destroy life. When a man talies it 
in his head that the knowledge of some subtle points of 
the schools, or that the practice of some austere morti- 
fications, is necessary to salvation, he hath embraced 
an error; and when love to his fellow-creatures makes 
him undertake our conversion, his error is mixed with 
religion. Religion and falsehood thus united drive a 
man mad, and impel him to harbour base passions, to 
spend himself in unnatural and unnecessary exertions, 
and to plot and persecute all for the glory of God and 
for the good of mankind. We have in history a multi-" 
tude of martyrs. Perhaps some few have died martj^rs 
to their own folly. What is necessary to preserve life 
from this specious attack ? A little common sense and 
good temper. Recollect, I am not censuring any good 
man, be his errors what they may, except he holds 
them in a spirit of bitterness and persecution. No man 
shall ever persuade me that such a spirit is friendly to 
health and life. 

Whatever such a religion may be to its owners, it 
holds the lives of others cheap ; and it seems to me to be 
a remnant of that murderous part of religion, persecu- 
tion. God forbid, we should preserve ourselves by de- 
stroying others. Is it not possible for us all to live and 
be happy ? Give me leave to read you a bit of a 
letter, which a great and good man in the north of Eu- 
rope, more than two hundred years ago, wrote to that 
pious Protestant persecutor, Theodore Beza, minister 
at Geneva. 

" You contend, that Scripture is a perfect rule of 



SELF-PRESERVATIOIf. 399 

faith and practice. But you are all divided about the 
sense of Scripture, and you have not settled who shall 
^}e judge. You say one thing-. My teacher says anoth- 
er. You quote Scripture, he quotes Scripture. You 
reason, he reasons. You require me to believe you. 
I respect you : but why should 1 trust you rather than 
my own minister? You say, he is a heretic: but the 
catholics say you are both heretics. Shall I believe 
them ? They quote histories and fathers. So do you. 
To whom do you all address yourselves 1 Where is the 
judge ? You say, the spirits of the prophets are subject 
to the prophets : but you say, I am no prophet, and 1 
say you are not one. Who is to judge ? You have 
broken off your yoke, allow me to break mine. Hav- 
ing freed yourselves from the tyranny of popish pre- 
lates, why do you turn ecclesiastical tyrants yourselves^ 
and treat others with barbarity and cruelty for only do- 
ing what you set them an example to do ? You say, 
your lay-hearers, the magistrates, and not you, minis- 
ters, are to be blamed, for it is they who banish and 
burn for heresy, and not you. I know you make this 
excuse : but, tell me, have not you instilled such prin- 
ciples into their ears, or have they done any thing more 
than practise the doctrine you taught them ? Have 
you not told them how glorious it is to defend the faith? 
Have you not been the constant admirers and flatterers' 
of such princes as have depopulated whole districts for 
heresy ? Do you not daily teach, that they who ap- 
peal from your confessions to Scripture ought to be 
punished by the secular power? It is impossible for 
you to deny this. You have published books to justify 
the banishing of one old teacher, and the execution of 
another, and you seem to wish we would follow your 
example, and kill men for not believing as we do. God 
forbid. When you talk of your Lutheran confession, 
and your Calvinistical creed, and your unanimity, and 
your fundamental truth, I keep thinking of the sixth 
Commandment, ' Thou shait not kill.' Farewell, most 
learned and respected Beza. Take what I have said 
in good part, and continue your friendship to me." 
I see by your looks you relish this letter. It does 



400 MORNING EXERCISES. 

you honour. It was written by a great master in the 
school of reli2^ion and good manners. I well tell you 
more ahout him some leisure day. Mean time, I will 
lend you this letter, and see, here is one of the pretti- 
est bound hymn-books that ever I saw ; I will put the 
letter into it, and the little boy, who brings me the fair- 
est written copy of it this day month, shall have this 
hymn-book. He that says it by heart, stands upright, 
looks pleasantly, and pronounces it with a soft, but full- 
mouthed gracefulness to me, as the writer would have 
done to Mr. Beza, he shall have another like it: an(} 
he that best explains some of the hard w^ords to me, 
such as heresy^ minister^ magistrate^ secular power., 
prelate.) Lutheran creed^ and so on, he shall have a 
third. Do not be afraid. Ask your father, or the 
school-master, or somebody, and come and tell me when 
I come again. We shall make it out among us, I dare 
saj^, and understand it as well as the writer did. Come, 
let us finish by singing two verses of this incomparable 
Jbymn-book. 

Our li^e contains a thousand springs, 

And dies if one be gone : 
Strange ! that a harp of thousand strings 

Should keep in tune so long. 

But 'tis our God supports our frame, 

The God that built us firbt. 
Salvation to the Almighty name. 

That reared us from the dust* 



401 

EXERCISE VI. 

THE JEWS. 

[AT WICKHAM BROOK.] 

HosEA iii, 5. 

Afterward shall the children of Israel fear the Lord and 
his goodness in the latter days. 

Always when I see a Jew, I recollect a saying of the 
Lord by the Prophet Isaiah, " Thou art the seed of 
Abraham my friend," and I find a thousand thoughts in 
my mind, impelling me to my duty. I am going this 
morning just to give you a sketch of a subject, that 
would fill volumes, and a subject of which we ought not 
to be ignorant. 

First, let us inform ourselves of the general history 
of this people. The father of the family was Abraham. 
He was born in the east, of an idolatrous family, and, 
at the command of God, he became the first dissenter in 
the world. He quitted his country, and went, and set 
up the worship of one God in his own family, and taught 
them to practise it. From this man proceeded a fami- 
ly, which increased into tribes, and formed a people as 
the stars in the heaven, or the sand on the seashore for 
multitude. Idolatry and immorality sometimes infect- 
ed a few : but the bulk preserved the belief of one 
God, and the imitation of his perfections inviolably for 
ages. They were shepherds, and lived, inbosomed in 
forests and fastnesses, a plain, frugal, laborious life, un- 
acquainted with the world, and unpractised in the arts 
and luxuries of polished nations. They assembled to 
worship God by prayers and sacrifice at every new moon, 
where the old heads of families taught morality, and 
inculcated the hope excited by the promise of God, that 
in one of their family all the families of the earth 
should be blessed with the knowledge of their God, and 
their moralitv. Thus read the book of Genesis, ai;id 
34* 



402 MORNING EXERCISER. 

other Scripture histories of the same times, and with- 
out forming any romantic ideas of imitation impossible 
except in their circumstances, admire the history, ap- 
prove the prophecy, and copy the inoffensive purity of 
their lives. 

When these people were in slavery in Egypt, they 
were at a school in which Providence taught them, by 
their own feelings, the nature and the worth of liberty, 
both civil and religious. What noble efforts they made 
to obtain it, and how God crowned their honest endeav- 
ours with success under the direction of Moses, Joshua, 
and the Judges, you will read in the four books of Mo- 
ses, Joshua, Judges, and Ruth. When they changed 
their government into an absolute monarchy, they en- 
slaved themselves, and overwhelmed their country with 
idolatry, immorality, and calamities of every kind. 
Read the Prophecies with the light of history of times, 
persons, and places, which is contained in Samuel, 
Kings, Chronicles, Ezra, Nehemiah, and Esther, and 
you will easily discover what religion had to object 
against a tyrannical government, an idolatrous worship, 
and dissolute manners ; and what it had to do in bear- 
ing affliction, reforming worship, and cherishing hope 
of better times under the direction of the expected 
prince of the house of David. 

When he came, and addressed himself to the blessing 
of all nations with an universal religion, some of his 
countrymen put him to death ; but others espoused his 
cause, wrote his history, and reasoned to establish it, 
not in the form of a secular kingdom, but in the convic- 
tions and consciences of reasonable men. There it 
hath stood ever since, and, though the bulk of the Jews 
have been scattered and punished for crucifying Christ, 
yet, by being kept a separate people, they serve to 
prove the truth of the Gospel 5 and the text, with many 
others ;ike it, promises that " they shall reverence the 
Lord in the latter days." The Epistle to the Hebrews 
lies ready for their use at that day. I think nothing 
can be easier than to apply this historical knowledge to 
its proper use ; and yet some Christians have got such 
an unwise and wayward knack of reasoning as to quote 



THE JEWS. 403 

whatever was among the Jews in proof of what ought to 
be now : as if the economy that crucified Christ was to 
restore him his character and dignity ! 

Remark next the customs of this people. They serve, 
as their history does, to interpret Scripture. Our text 
is connected with one. A part of this prophecy is a 
drama. The young gentlemen in the right hand cor- 
ner know what I mean, and I will try to make you all 
understand me. A drama, in our present view, is a 
subject both related and represented. Divines call it 
preaching by signs. These signs were proper to re- 
present to the eye the subject spoken of to the ear. 
Thus Jeremiah explained slavery with a yoke upon 
his neck ; and Jesus simplicity, by setting a " little 
child" before his disciples. The Prophet Hosea was 
ordered to open to the Jews their prostitution to wick- 
edness and miserj^, the patience and goodness of God, 
and the effect, which in time his goodness would have 
upon their descendants. Full of these subjects, the Pro- 
phet comes into a public assembly of the nation, and 
brings along with him a prostitute with three children, 
one of which, it should seem, she had conceived and 
borne by her own father. He gives his children names 
suited to his views, and utters the prophecy contained 
in the two first chapters. In the third chapter he is 
described as coming again, and bringing with him, not a 
prostitute in single life, but an adulteress, perhaps in 
liquor, or acting as if she were, to represent a people 
remarkable for " loving flaggons of wine." This wo- 
man had been hired to act this part for several days, at 
a price agreed on between herself and the prophet. 
Imagine a great national assembly at a public festival. 
Conceive the public attention caught by the entrance 
of the prophet, and his scandalous companions. Sup- 
pose him to ascend an eminence, and to place these mis- 
erable objects near him in full view of every body. 
Imagine him to harangue on the nature and necessity of 
virtue, especially to the people under contract, as a 
wife to her husband, or a nation to their God. Suppose 
him to reason on the iniquity of violated faith in every 
fcrm. Suppose him to expatiate in tears, " smiting with 



404 



MORNING EXERCISES. 



the hand, and stamping with the foot," on the poTerty, 
contempt, guilt, and misery of such injustice. Imagine 
him to unfold the conduct of God, and the effects, which 
such goodness ought to produce in man. Suppose the 
wretched prostitutes and their children, on the last day, 
to be brought to public contrition, asking pardon of God 
and man, received again into favour, clothed anew in 
bridal ornaments, and sent avvaj with a thousand emo- 
tions of gratitude and religion in themselves, and a pro- 
fusion of benefits and blessings from the people. Doth 
it not seem to you, that the prophet might be very elo- 
quent on these subjects, bring many to faith and repent- 
ance, and convert a custom indifferent in itself into a 
very powerful mode of information ? 

Further, let us aiiow the merit of the Jews. They 
deserve all the reputation, which the inspired writers 
give them. They exhibit single characters of consum- 
mate virtue, as Abraham for iaith, Moses for meekness, 
Nehemiah for love of his country, and so on. As a na- 
tion they excelled in some periods in arms, in others in 
industry, commerce, splendour, and wealth ; and in all, 
in good writers ; for what historians are equal to Mo- 
ses and the Evangelists, or what ancient poetry breathes 
such pure and sublime sentiments as that of the Jews ? 
As a church they preserved the oracles of God, and at 
their fall their remnants became the "riches of the 
world." The apostle of us Gentiles was a Jew, and to 
say all in one word, the Saviour and the judge of mankind 
was a Jew. Let us respect the ancient Jews in the per- 
sons of their children, and for their sakes let us be 
friends to universal toleration. 

Let us recollect the svns and the calamities of these 
people. Their sins were many and enormous ; but it 
was the killing of Jesus Christ, that completed their ru- 
in. Let us examine what sins brought Jesus to the 
cross, and let us avoid the practice of them. Nor let 
us forget their calamities. They have been under all 
the punishments foretold four thousand years ago by 
Moses, and seem doomed to travel over the world to re- 
commend a Gospel which they reject and despise. 
Their prophets, we find, did not slander them ; they 



THE JEWS. 405 

are the people described, and their punishments prove 
the divine mission of their prophets. Thus God is glo- 
rified, whether man be lost or saved. In some future 
time he will be glorified in us, either his mercy if we 
embrace it, or his justice if we reject it, for to reject 
the Gosuel is to reject both the mercy and the justice 
of God. ^ 

Let us finish by observing the recall of the Jews. 
The prophets foretell it, and a course of events renders 
it probable. They are preserved a distinct people, 
though the nations that conquered them are lost. They 
are more numerous now than they were when a nation. 
The Gospel is truth and virtue struggling against er- 
ror and vice : it is natural to hope that the stronger 
must in time subdue the weaker. Error and vice are 
supported by man : but truth and virtue by God. Let 
us not despair. The Jews came out of Egypt under 
the conduct of a shepherd with only a rod in his hand 
to point out the way. Providence is at no loss for 
means to effect its purposes ; " he worketh all things 
after the counsel of his own will." 

There are four things implied in the text, which the 
Jews will reverence in the latter days. First, That di- 
vine patience, which bore with their provocations : after 
they have rejected Moses and the prophets, after they 
have committed crimes of every sort, after they have 
crucified Christ, persecuted his apostles, and persevered 
for ages in approving the crime ; aftevwards shall the 
children of Israel reverence the Lord for his patience, 
which out-lasted all their perverseness. 

Next, they will reverence his providence, which, 
when they were persecuted in one country, always pro- 
vided them an asylum in another. Providence hath 
given them skill, and made them useful to many nations. 
It hath prospered their industry, and crowned it with 
plenty, so that their riches are almost as proverbial as 
their infidelity. When Jews from all countries, in the 
latter daj's, shall compile their own history of their dis- 
persion, it must needs display a bright scene of Provi- 
dence, which they themselves will reverence in those 
days. 



406 MORNING EXERCISES. 

Will they not also reverence the grace of God ? The 
Lord will both forgive their offences, and restore them 
to favour. To this we add, the glory^ of God, as anoth- 
er object of reverence. Great and marvellous displays 
of Divine power have been made in favour of this peo- 
ple formerly, and, it should seem by the Prophecies, 
more such displays will be made in favour of them at 
their "return to their first husband."" May God hasten 
it in his time. 

What remains ? Only this at present. Let us avoid 
putting stumblingblocks in the way of the Jews. Let 
us propose Christianity to them as Jesus proposed it to 
them. Instead of the modern magic of scholasticai di- 
vinity, let us lay before them their own Prophecies. 
Let us show them their accomplishment in Jesus. Let 
us applaud their hatred of idolatry. Let us show them 
the morality of Jesus in our lives and tempers. Let us 
never abridge their civil liberty, nor ever try to force 
their consciences. Let us remind them, that as Jews 
they are bound to make the law of Moses ' the rule of 
their actions. Let us try to inspire them with suspicion 
of rabbinical and received traditions, and a generous 
love of investio-ntiDg religious truth for themselves. Let 
us avoid all rash judging, and leave their future state to 
God. Read at your leisure the sixty-third chapter of 
Isaiah, in the beginning of which Jesus Christ is describ- 
ed as the Judge of the world, and the passage is ex- 
plained in that sense in the revelation of John. It is 
the Judge alone, whose habit is stained with blood ; the 
saints, white aad C'*^?i>i, only follow him to behold and 
applaud his justice. Grace and peace be with you ! 
Amen. 

THE END. 



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